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The McNultys had a long career on stage and record. Annie Burke McNulty (1887–1970), who arrived in New York in 1910 from Kilteevan, County Roscommon, was widowed in 1928 on the eve of the Depression. The family band was her ticket to economic survival. With a blend of rhythmic melodeon music, Irish steps and American tap dance and old-time Irish popular songs, the McNultys became the “First Family of Irish Music,” beloved by audiences in the city and on the Rockaway Peninsula, New York’s “Irish Riviera.” Traditional purists might turn up their noses at the McNultys’ vaudevillian style, but the New York Irish audience embraced them. In their heyday in the 1930s and early 1940s, they were undoubtedly the most popular Irish music performers in America.
