Matthew Carey: The Irish Immigrant Who Shaped Early America
Our American Stories
iHeartPodcasts
4.6 • 817 Ratings
🗓️ 5 May 2026
⏱️ 12 minutes
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Summary
On this episode of Our American Stories, in 1784, a young Irishman named Matthew Carey stepped off a ship in Philadelphia with twelve guineas in his pocket and a past that had already forced him out of his home country. Having written against British rule and the treatment of Irish Catholics, he arrived in the United States convinced the new republic offered something different.
Carey rose to become one of early America’s most influential publishers, but his path was anything but easy. He faced discrimination for his Irish heritage and Catholic faith, survived a near-fatal duel defending his honor, and used his platform to argue that immigrants and outsiders could help strengthen the nation.
Karen Kaufmann shares the story of a man who helped shape early American ideas about citizenship, opportunity, and what it meant to be an American. We'd like to thank the Jack Miller Center for telling us about this tale.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is an I-Heart podcast. |
| 0:02.6 | Guaranteed Human. |
| 0:04.3 | Hey, this is Robert from the Stuff to Blow Your Mind podcast. |
| 0:07.7 | Joe and I are both lifelong Star Wars fan, so we're celebrating May the 4th with a brand |
| 0:11.8 | new week of fun, thought-provoking Star Wars-related episodes. |
| 0:15.5 | Join us as we tackle science and culture topics from a galaxy far, far away, such as the |
| 0:20.3 | biology of taunons and wampas |
| 0:22.2 | on the ice planet hot, or the practicality and corporate business sense of the Sith rule of two. |
| 0:28.3 | Listen to Stuff to Bo Your Mind on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your |
| 0:33.5 | podcasts. |
| 0:44.3 | Music your podcasts. And we continue with our American stories. |
| 0:48.3 | It's a general theme in the air that America has never been more divided than right now. |
| 0:55.1 | Up next, Karen Kaufman is here to disprove that claim. |
| 1:00.4 | Take it away, Karen. |
| 1:05.1 | Since the formation of the United States, the nation was never a perfect union. |
| 1:13.6 | During the Revolutionary War, approximately 20% of the white population remained loyal to the British crown. Families were divided, |
| 1:20.6 | friendships dissolved. After the war when former loyalists attempted to re-establish their lives |
| 1:26.6 | within the New Republic, |
| 1:28.3 | they occasionally met violent, verbal, and physical resistance, |
| 1:32.3 | grounded in the allegation that they were not real Americans. |
| 1:37.3 | In addition to internal tensions, foreign enemies tried to exploit fractures that had existed since the colonial period, hoping for the collapse of the infant nation. |
| 1:48.0 | These were uncertain and often dangerous times, characterized by shrill accusations against political opponents |
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