This is a noisy place, and it must have been even noisier back in the 1960s when James (Jimmy) and Alice O’Keefe lived here. From their doorstep, they could watch as the city was ripped in half by the massive interstate highway project—the construction of US Route 95. Their neighborhood was wiped away. As I drew by the freeway, the soundtrack was a rhythm of whooshing and blurping from trucks and cars, behind and below.
Jimmy O’Keefe came to America with his family from rural East Cork, Ireland, as a very young boy in 1906. He grew up to become a bricklayer. Toward the end of his life, he lived on a floor of this house on Byfield Street in South Providence. Jimmy was my mother’s uncle, who, according to my parents, tap danced at their wedding reception. That was his thing. He had a portable section of wooden flooring that he brought with him for tap performances for friends and family—often accompanied by his older brother Mike, who played the accordion. That’s a degree of Irish-Americanness that had faded by my time.
This leads me to wonder more about the noise in this house, and about the other families who lived here. I’m curious what floor Jimmy lived on and how often he tap danced at home
Visiting the Relatives 