PARADES & SUCH

St. Patrick’s Day in America
Before there was a United States or a Canada, there were Irish in North America and they celebrated St. Patricks. Today, St. Patrick’s Day is the greatest ethnic celebration in America with hundreds of cities having parades and parties. It is only for St. Patrick’s Day that Fifth Avenue in New York City is closed to traffic for the annual parade no matter what day of the week March 17th falls on. The New York parade is considered the biggest in the U.S. but is being closely followed by many who vie for the laurel, including Chicago, Miami, Savannah, Oakland, Boston, New Orleans and San Francisco. According to the New York St. Patrick’s Day Committee, the first New York parade was on March 17th, 1762. It was the custom of the times for the Irish in New York to celebrate the patron saint with ‘breakfasts’, one year they staged an impromptu march through the streets of Colonial New York. And that high spirited march has been repeated every year since. Things haven’t changed much, except when the spectators repair to the local taverns.

St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin
Built on the site of another church called St. Patrick’s, the Cathedral was dedicated on March 17, 1192. It was built outside the then city walls. The site was supposed to have been used by Patrick for baptism. In 1901, the remains of an ancient well were discovered under a huge stone slab which can be seen in the Cathedral. St. Patrick tended his animals on slemish mountain in county Armagh.

St. Patrick’s Centre, Downpatrick, County Down The New World Center for St. Patrick is located beside Saint Patrick’s Grave within the ancient town of Downpatrick, medieval capital of County Down. The center is just 30 minutes from Belfast in St. Patrick’s Country between the Mountains of Mourne and Strangford Lough. Facilities at the center include Interpretive Exhibition, Art Gallery, Restaurant, craft and gift shop.

Parades
The earliest recorded evidence of St. Patrick's Day being celebrated outside of Ireland, other than by Irish soldiers, is provided by Jonathan Swift, the Dublin-born author of Gulliver's Travels.  In his Journal to Stella, he notes that in 1713 the parliament at Westminster (London) was closed because it was St. Patrick's Day and that the Mall in London was so full of decorations that he thought "all the world was Irish".

The first St. Patrick’s Day parade on record was held in New York in 1762 and seems to have been designed primarily as a recruiting rally by the English army in North America. The Americans were later to use the parade for similar ends.

The Irish in North America fought on both the English and French sides during the Seven Years War. In 1757, "English" troops camped at Fort Henry were attacked on St. Patrick’s Day by "French" troops. The French contingent was largely made up of Irishmen. They reckoned that the many Irishmen in the English contingent would be the worse for wear, given the day that was in it. But they reckoned without the canniness of the English commander, John Stark. He had given his Irish troops their extra celebratory drop of grog the previous day! The French lost.

St. Patrick’s Day parades these days take place not only in New York and Boston, but also in Savannah, Chicago, Miami, San Francisco and New Orleans.