Like the O’Brien’s grave, the Maylor headstone contains some Irish earth: After Mary Barrett Maylor died, her husband, Samuel Lindsay Maylor, traveled back to their native Cork to have a Gaelic headstone engraved.

If you end up visiting the Whidbey Island Grave, the text translates to a top-level timeline of her life: “Mary Barrett died here April 9, AD 1861. She was 31 years of age. She was born in Nenagh Ireland, beloved wife of Samuel Maylor. They were married in Liverpool in St. Peter's Church 21st December 1856. They had three sons, Paul, Thomas B and Mairion S. Her father was John (Eoin) Barrett, Tralee. Her mother Clara Page, Limerick. Arise.”

The marker is at Sunnyside Cemetery in Coupeville on Whidbey Island. More guidance can be found on Find A Grave.

This headstone has a sad but sweet story: Terence and Maria O’Brien left Ireland for the Pacific Northwest in 1862, but Maria died the day before their ship docked. Terence had promised that Maria would be buried in Irish soil—so he had a load of soil shipped from Ireland.

While the grave was initially located in Victoria, it was moved—Irish soil and all—to Seattle upon Terence’s death. Their son, Terence Jr., erected a very expensive, $1,400 monument on top.

That still wasn’t the last stop for the grave: In 1893, the cemetery was ordered vacated, so Terence Jr. camped out by his parents’ graves demanding his parents’ remains not be moved. Eventually, the church agreed to move the whole lot, with the soil and headstone.

What the Irish Club calls “Seattle’s genuine ‘bit o’ the ould sod’” is now in Calvary Cemetery, not far from University Village. For help finding the grave, Find A Grave has more detailed information.

Seattle and Galway have been sister cities since 1986—and to commemorate years of intercity friendship, both cities placed stone monuments dedicated to one another. Galway’s was placed in 1993, but we took until 2000 to get ours together.

The monument, shaped like a large stone, has a bronze marker on top with geophysical data of Galway, with an arrow pointing in the city’s direction. It’s on the waterfront, right across from Pier 66.

Address is approximate.

Dublin-born Rossell G. O’Brien was a former mayor and city council member in Olympia—and, for better or worse, he may be a huge reason why it’s custom to stand during the national anthem.

The story goes that at a meeting of former Union officers at the Bostwick Building in Tacoma in 1893, O’Brien made a motion that "people should rise and remove their hats, if they were not in the military, and stand at attention for the playing of the national anthem."

Some say O’Brien isn’t the first to come up with this—Daniel Webster is credited for popularizing the practice, too. But regardless, a local Daughters of the American Revolution chapter installed a plaque on the Bostwick Building, which is now apartments and the Bostwick Cafe, commemorating O’Brien’s motion in 1970.