Research adds Irish link to Obama's ancestry

[oberliner]

DUBLIN, Ireland – Everybody knows presidential hopeful Barack Obama is blessed with the gift of the gab. Turns out it might be the Irish in him.

The junior senator from Illinois, seeking the Democratic nomination for the White House, has made much of his background as the son of a Kenyan father and American mother. Far less publicized is the European side of his family tree – including, new research has found, a great-great-great grandfather from the heart of Ireland.

A genealogy Web site, Ancestry.com, has spent months looking to pin down the origins of Obama's ancestors – including Fulmouth Kearney, who immigrated to the United States at 19 and has ties to Obama's Kansas-reared mother, Ann Dunham.

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/politics/national/stories/051707dnnatobamairish.75ef6373.html