Tenant Farmers

Resource for Grades 4-12
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Tenant Farmers

Media Type:
Video

Running Time: 1m 13s
Size: 26.0 MB

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Source: Faces of America: "Tenant Farmers"

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WNET

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WNET

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Collection Funded by:

Coca-Cola

Faces of America on VITAL is made possible by The Cola Company.

Funding for Faces of America on PBS was provided by The Coca-Cola Company and Johnson & Johnson. Additional funding was provided by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, The Atlantic Philanthropies, and The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. Additional support is provided by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and PBS.


In this video from Faces of America, we learn about comedian Stephen Colbert and his Irish Ancestors, the Tucks. The Tucks left Ireland during the Great Potato Famine of the mid-nineteenth century. There are almost no records of the Tucks, but we find out that they were tenant farmers, like most Irish Catholics at that time. While still living in Ireland, they endured great hardships under the then British rule including laws prohibiting Irish Catholics from practicing their faith, buying land and even owning a horse.
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open Discussion Questions

  • Describe what life was like for Stephen Colbert’s Irish ancestors in the 1820s.
  • Was Colbert able to uncover any information about his ancestors, the Tucks, when he and his family visited Ireland? Explain.
  • What may have motivated Colbert’s early 19th century relatives to leave Ireland?
  • What challenge did the Colbert family have when they returned to Ireland in an attempt to locate their ancestors?
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Narration: Stephen’s mother is the great-granddaughter of a couple who left Ireland’s county Laois in the 1820s. at the time, the English aristocracy who ruled Ireland called it “Queens county.” Stephen’s ancestors, like most Irish Catholics, were tenant farmers. English laws prevented Catholics from buying land, from practicing their faith, holding public office, or even owning a horse. They could not – or would not – record the details of their lives in church or civil records. so they left Ireland without a trace.

Gates: Have you ever gone looking for your roots in Ireland?

Stephen Colbert: When I was fourteen, we went over to Dublin and then we drove across to Limerick, and on the way we stopped at a bunch of different places. We went to Roscommon, which is the last, you know, the last lead we had on the Tucks… and we found a lot of dead ones. It would say things like “went west…” which could mean Limerick, or it could mean the United States… and so, never found any over there.

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