About Our Club

                                       

Welcome to Notre Dame's "Gettysburg Address"
Jim Conrad, NDF
President / 2009-2010

The Notre Dame Club of Gettysburg is one of the newest ND Alumni Clubs worldwide (chartered in July 2004), but our ties to Notre Dame go back 145 years to the afternoon of 2 July, 1863, the 2nd, and pivotal day of the 3-day Battle of Gettysburg. A day when the Chaplain of the Irish Brigade, Father William Corby, CSC stood upon a rock in the center of the Union Army's line and gave General Absolution to his men who knelt before him. As one observer put it, "For many, they knelt in their burial clothes." When the brief ceremony was over - the Irish Brigade was called "To Arms" and marched at a "quick step" into a hellish place called "The Wheatfield". Father Corby would return to Notre Dame to become its 3rd and 5th President during a period of dramatic, post Civil War growth. Here in Gettysburg we like to say "The Roots of the Fighting Irish are here." Long before a football game was played on Notre Dame's old Cartier Field, Irish immigrants from Boston, New York and Philadelphia were fighting for their new country - America. They were fighting and dying to show that they deserved to be seen as Americans too. They may have been born in Ireland, but they chose to become Americans.

There are two identical statues of Father William Corby at Gettysburg and Notre Dame, generous gifts of the men of the Irish Brigade, out of respect for their beloved Chaplain. Today 2 million visitors pass the Father Corby statue on the Gettysburg Battlefield. Many pause and reflect. They know the story of Father Corby.

Our Web site is continually under construction, but I can assure you it should be a valuable resource for all with an interest in Notre Dame, in Gettysburg, and in Father Corby. We now hold an annual "Field Mass" at the Corby statue near the Battle Anniversaries (July 1-3). In recent years this has occurred on the last Saturday of June. It will take place in 2010 on June 26th.  Check this Web site for upcoming events that run the gamut from Field Masses, Hesburgh lectures (ND faculty lectures at local venues), Game Watches, Community Service projects and yes, football trips to Notre Dame.

So, Welcome...Current and future Club members alike. Please call me if you have any questions concerning the club. My telephone number is (443) 370-9740. I would love to hear from you! Also, you can reach me via email at james.conrad@verizon.net.

Best regards and GO IRISH!

Jim Conrad 

                                    Notre Dame Club of Gettysburg

                              PO Box 82 - McSherrystown, PA 17344-0082
                                                                                                          

 

CLUB HISTORY

The Gettysburg Club is a very active organization. A quick view of club activities can be seen in the our club newsletters, which are available via the Club Newsletter page on this site.  Newsletters   The Gettysburg Club was named Outstanding Club for our size category at the 2007 SENATE. Click here for pictures. In 2008 the club received a Citation Award for our Walter Reed Project and the Program Excellence Award for the third year in a row. Senate 2008    Click here for 2009 SENATE Report

The Gettysburg Club strives to make membership in the organization an enjoyable experience. Questions on any aspect of the club are encouraged and can be addressed to any of the Board members or sent via email to Jim Conrad at james.conrad@verizon.net.  Jim will also gladly receive calls from members and prospective members on (443) 370-9740.

GETTYSBURG CLUB MEMBERSHIP AREA - The Notre Dame Club of Gettysburg was created by the ND Alumni Association Senate 2004.

Our club can be thought of as a Mason-Dixon Line Club shown above. It is half way between the nation's capitol of Washington D.C. and the capitol of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania in Harrisburg. It is a series of communities flowing along the old Lincoln Highway from York in the East through Hanover, McSherrystown, Bonneauville, Gettysburg, and westward to Chambersburg, Shippensburg and Waynesboro and Mercersburg...it also dips down into Maryland and the small, but historic town of Emmitsburg (home of Mount St. Mary¹s University and the National Shrine of Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton). These communities tend to live in a common world and refer to themselves as "South Central Pennsylvania" or "Mason-Dixon country".

Politically it is the 19th U.S. District of Pennsylvania in the U.S. Congress.