[1] Quakers were known for entrepreneurship, setting up many businesses in Ireland, with many families such as the Goodbodys, Bewley's, Pims, Lambs, Jacobs, Edmundsons, Perrys, and Bells involved in milling, textiles, shipping, imports and exports, food and tobacco production, brewing, iron production and railway industries.
[2] William Penn, the founder of Pennsylvania, converted to Quakerism while dealing with his father's estates in Ireland.
The Quakers founded the town of Mountmellick, County Laois, in 1657, led by William Edmundson.
Among the famous non-Quakers to go there were Henry Grattan, Cardinal Paul Cullen, James Napper Tandy, and Edmund Burke.
The Quakers building on Eustace Street, purchased in 1817, is the former Eagle Tavern, it is where the Dublin Society of the United Irishmen was formed in 1791.
[10] The Society was one of the six religious denominations recognized by article 44.1.3 of the Irish Constitution, which was adopted by popular plebiscite in 1937.
[18][19] There is a Quaker service every Sunday at St Nicholas National School, Waterside, Galway.