By 2006, having always known of my Irish history, I decided to research this whole return home to Ireland topic further. I found a little known line of legislation that granted citizenship to those who had grandparents born in Ireland- who knew? 

While this route towards citizenship has become far more popular today, it was practically unheard of back then. I spent nearly two difficulty years obtaining documents, attending embassy appointments and navigating multiple layers of government process, and first in my American relatives to be issued my Irish Passport making me a proud dual citizen of the USA and Ireland to this day! 

Tom Egan

My name is Tom Egan. I was born and raised in a small corner of Clare, Ireland, an area that most of the world either didn't know about or wouldn't care to remember if they did. The village I am from is a small scattering of houses nestled in between the bends of the river Shannon as it winds itself through the rolling fields.

We had a church and a small school. There wasn't enough people to support a local shop (although it did support two traditional pubs). It was what people would call “Old Ireland”; rural communities that centered on farming, Irish language and the Gaelic Athletic Association.

Despite the quiet life that came with this way of living, it brought one thing in particular: Community. You knew everyone and everyone knew you. It fostered a common kindness, not based on ideology or belief but the values of one as a person.

I largely took this for granted growing up but I now relish in this sense of community that I was raised in.

I was educated in the University of Limerick in which I obtained a Criminal justice degree, along with a Law degree. Following this, I worked in the area of Immigration law for 6 years, allowing myself to understand the processes and systems of the Irish immigration policy. During this time, I spoke and dealt with a lot of American citizens, in which I had to deal with a vast spectrum of issues and problems that they were facing and needed vital support to complete. 

I really enjoy this area of Immigration Law. The ability to speak to people all over the world seeking to come home to Ireland on a daily basis is something I cherish. Along the way, it was the help and guidance I gave to Irish-American citizens that really stuck with me. The kindness and generosity of all American citizens I dealt with has stayed with me and gives me once again the feeling like I had in the village where I was raised.  And my passion is to help many more find their way home.

 I was shocked that they cared about my green fields and community so much.  My experience and my knowledge put me in a unique position so that when Mike, the co-founder came to me and pitched the idea of a relocation and citizenship service specially tailored for American citizens who feel that Irish safe harbor calling, there was no way I could refuse. Life has a way of presenting you opportunities that you cannot refuse. I took that opportunity.

I recommend you do too.

Michael Caslin

Personally, this bond was confirmed when I travelled to the US in the summer of 2023. I was able to travel from the east coast to the west coast over the course of 3 months in a trip that will always stay with me. Everyone I met had the American hospitality I had heard of, offering food, drinks, offering to repair tires, offering places to sleep and any help they could provide. Amazingly though, almost every person I spoke with held a deep curiosity of Ireland, an attraction and almost spiritual affinity they could not quite explain.

On my father’s side- whose name sake I share, my grandfather, Michael Caslin was from County Roscommon.  As a child, he had survived the great famine. In the 1870’s he decided to board a ship and the winds, storms and the currents decided what area of North American coast line the ship would finally meet. The Atlantic journey was perilous; starvation, disease and illness still being a common factor yet he took the gamble- life finds a way and ended up in New York.

My grandparents on my mothers side faced a similar journey, this time, not leaving Ireland during the hardship of the 1850’s Great Hunger but during another catasrophe - the bloody Irish Civil War of the early 1920’s.  This was a time where the emergence of an Irish state, recently granted its own independence was wracked by a brutal civil war fought between brothers and friends, each with an equal passion and belief for what was best for the free state of Eire.  My maternal grandparents, although from remote Irish villages near Errigal Mountain, in remote northwest Donegal, had never met till a chance encounter at a dance in Brooklyn, NYC. Sadly the Crash of 1929 came the same year my grandfather whom I never met passed away as a Sandhog/Tunnel Tiger while digging the Holland Tunnel- connecting New York City and Jersey City.

I cannot express the joy and pride I felt as I finally held that dark maroon passport with a glittering gold harp in my hands.  The Emerald lands kissed by the Atlantic, opened its arms once again, just as America did.  While more years would pass, the thought of moving to Ireland would grow larger.  After being awarded a US Fulbright from the US State Department to bring Social Entrepreneurship to Ireland, my personal motivation -which is key in this process to define- became clear and it was to give back to the country that made our lives in America first possible and to strengthen a new and growing Ireland in any way I could.  While the way forward was unchartered, and my family roots with nearly a hundred relations in America had not lived in Ireland for three generations, it started with a stain glass image of St. Patrick in my local church of St. Mary’s, Kingston, where I felt the growing call to return. Little did I know it was the call of the Wild Geese of Ireland to return home.

Obtaining my Irish citizenship and hurdling massive paper processes had surely tested my executive function the limits, especially being mildly dyslexic.  And then the thought of moving to Ireland, with my family who at the time were not Irish citizens seemed like it could barely be possible to take a next step.  And this is when I met Wild Geese co-founder Tom Egan. 

He made everything clear, precise and understood the specific needs of me as an Irish-American coming back home. As we went through the process together, I started to understand there was so much more going on than just the immigration permission for my family. Tom was willing to help me with everything, not as part of the contractual service we had agreed to but from the genuine kindness and willingness that is instilled in his Irish genes. I became ever more aware that there was a huge unmet need for such customized help to help Ireland build new Ireland with empowered Irish-Americans.

I know there are millions of Americans just like me that feel that same urge, the same yearning to return to Emerald shores and like me were only held back by the fog of the unknown and a seemingly daunting government process.  We believe these hurdles should not be greater than the power of the sacred bond across generations now on both sides of the Atlantic and this is why I have made it my passion to provide a service that makes your dream to return home to Ireland a dream that can be made possible

Over the years, I was instilled with the Irish work ethic- a belief that there is a better life for those who grab the opportunity- the only way out being up. This resulted in an entrepreneurial spirit that I hold to this day.

Over the course of 40 years, I have created and operated numerous companies, been an author, investor, philanthropist, TV producer and featured Social Entrepreneurship Lecturer at some of the top schools in America like Babson College, Harvard, Columbia, Stanford Universities.

In addition, I was a Sustainable Community advisor for the White House and even Dublin Airport Authority with its new Terminal 2- which welcomes 100,000 visitors each month and received numerous Awards including recognition as a US Fulbright Scholar, Babson College Appel Prize Fellow, Dartmouth College Halpern Prize Winner for Social Responsibility and UN Economic Commission of Europe Lecturer. 

All these skills and strengths I now commit to helping Wild Geese Immigration clients and their loved ones complete one of the most important journeys ever- the journey for you to come home to a safe harbor in Ireland

My name is Michael John Patrick Caslin. My story is like so many other of America’s 38.6 Million Irish- Americans.  I was born in New York City- Queens County to hard working parents with roots back to the Lower East Side and Upper West Side of Manhattan.

My parents worked hard and honestly for every dollar using their high school degrees and were able to provide a wonderful home, food on the plate and support of university and graduate degrees for all their 5 children. To us all we lived Irish values in building the American dream- a loving family and work that we loved. Both parents were children of elementary schooled Irish immigrants and heard first hand account of the struggle and heartache their relatives parents had undergone to leave Ireland in heart break in an effort to gain a better life in the United States.  With the bitter sadness, that you couldn’t feed your family on Ireland’s natural beauty alone, my great grandparents took the difficult step to leave Ireland.