The neighborhood was developed in the 1860s as a place of residence for employees of the Louisville and Nashville Railroad freight yard.

The Irish Catholic presence in Limerick was strong enough that from 1872 to 1918 an annual St Patrick's Day march went from the church to Broadway.

But as many of the railroad jobs left the area, the Irish began to move to South Louisville.

[1] As the Irish left, the African Americans moved from the alleyways into the vacated shotgun houses.

The news weekly Kentucky Irish American would be published from Limerick for nearly seventy years, starting in 1898.