2011 Saint Patrick's Day Parade "Parade Central " Over 100 Parade Around the World "Parade and Irish Festival Central" Where the irish meet on the internet.

Step off 12:30 noon

from Lincoln Park/Kennedy Blvd. north to Journal Square to the reviewing stand.

Breakfast

Saint Peter's College, Pavonia Room 8:00 am to 9:30 am - Tickets $8

2003 Saint Peter's College Irish Club Breakfast

2002 Breakfast at Saint Peter's College sponsored by SPC Irish Club

Mass

Saint Adan's 10 am sponsored by the Friendly Sons of Saint Patrick

2003 March Up Glenwood Avenue to Saint Aedan's Church

2002 March to Mass down Glenwood Avenue

Flag Raising

Friday, February ??th at 1:00 pm City Hall 280 Grove

Street refreshments following at Lacio's Summit House

2003 Jersey City Flag Raisings Page 1

2002 Flag Raising at City Hall

Dinner Dance

Friday, March 11th at 7:00 pm Casino in the Park featuring - Tickets are $110 for reservations call 201.963.5503, 201.333.1070 or 201.659.9273

2003 Jersey City Dinner Dance Page 1 Page 2 Page 3

2002 Diner Dance

Canada Montreal Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Canada Toronto Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Germany Munchen Bilder Saint Patrick's Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Germany Munich Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Ireland Ballymahon Longford Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Ireland Dublin Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Japan Tokyo Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Korea Seoul Saint Patrick's Day Parade

UK Birmingham Saint Patrick's Day Parade

UK London Whitehall Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Alexandria VA Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Atlantic City NJ Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Charlotte NC Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Cleveland Ohio Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Columbia SC Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Dallas Texas Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Des Moines Iowa Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Detroit A.O.H. Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Dublin City California Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Dublin Ohio Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Elmhurst IL Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Fort Lauderdale Florida Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Glen Cove NY Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Hoboken NJ Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Hollywood Florida Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Holyoke MA Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Lackawanna County PA Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Lake Ronkonkoma New York Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Los Angeles City CA Fireman's Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Manchester NH Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Milwaukee Wisconsin Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Mississippi Gulf Coast Shenigans Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Sea Isle City NJ Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Seattle Washington Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Sedona Arizona Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Sierra Vista Arizona Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Sioux Fall South Dakota Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Somerville New York Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Springfield Illinois Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Saint Louis Missouri Saint Patrick's Day Parade

Saint Paul Minnesota Saint Patrick's Day Parade

www.SaintPatricksDayParade.com

Calling Any Cop Named Patrick

http://saintpatricksdayparade.com/jerseycity/jerseycity.htm

The Far-From-Respectable Origin of a Jersey City Tradition

by Gene Scanlon

2001 Diner Dance Photos * 2001 Parade Photos * more 2001 photos

Gene Scanlon (Left) and Patrick Kenny, the First Grand Marshal of the Jersey City Saint Patrick's Day Parade on the occasion of P. J. Kenny's return visit to Jersey City in 1998

The annual St. Patrick's Day Parade along Kennedy Boulevard is such a tradition in Jersey City -- with its legions of bagpipers, shamrock-wearing priests, antique cars, Miss Colleen contestants and much else that you might suppose it had gone on forever. In fact, it dates back just three decades, and its beginnings were not what you might call respectable.

It was born in the Bergen Bar on the eve of St. Patrick's Day 1962. I should know; I was there. Five of us -- sad sons of the Ould Sod -- were drowning our sorrows, lamenting that Jersey City, unlike neighboring Newark and New York, did not have a big parade to honor Ireland's patron saint.

Maybe it was the Irish in me, but more likely the Guinness, that made me try to break up the gloom by suggesting that we form a committee right then and there and start making plans for a big parade the next year.

There were shouts of approval, and I was promptly named committee chairman. After ordering a round for everybody, I began a meeting that within minutes threatened to degenerate into a punch-throwing donnybrook.

It started with Tom Lally's suggestion that a certain politician be designated at the outset as the parade's grand marshal.

"You must be mad!" shouted Jim McLoughlin, slamming his fist on the bar. "He's the biggest crook in creation!" He then named a member of. the City Council, evoking an equally emphatic reply from Joe (Dapper) Fallon:
"Now wouldn't that be a thundering disgrace, him marching up front, the heathen!"

And so it went. Even Jim McCloskey's nominee, a heavy-brogued County Corkman who was also a monsignor, was rejected out of hand. With tempers running high by then, McCloskey might have been ejected from the bar if he hadn't been a co-owner of the place. After a dozen or more nominations, not one getting so much as a second, I shouted for attention and made a proposal: "Let's call Dublin police headquarters, making it person-to-person to any policeman named Patrick. The first one we contact, we invite him to lead our parade. Who can argue with that?"

Nobody could, So it was that at about 9 P.M on the eve of St. Patrick's Day 1962 (although it was already 2 A.M. on the Grand Day itself in Ireland), a phone rang in Dublin Castle, Garda Patrick J. Kenny answered it and accepted an invitation by the Jersey City St. Patrick's Day Parade Committee to lead its march on Sunday, March 17, 1963. Officer Kenny, then 41, father of six, had only one question before accepting the invitation: "Can I bring me wife?"

P, J. and Nancy Kenny landed at Idlewild Airport on March 7. (It became John F, Kennedy Airport after the President's assassination eight months later.) And on St. Patrick's Day, Garda Kenny, 6 foot 3, with a red mustache and in full uniform, stepped out alone, in military stride, leading more than 20,000 marchers. Nearly a quarter-million spectators along the two-mile parade route cheered them on.

The Jersey Journal said in an editorial that it was the grandest celebration the city had ever given itself. Taverns ran out of beer, and all-night diners ran out of food. The Kennys, who had been given a sendoff from Ireland by President Eamon De Valera, were received in Washington by Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson. (President Kennedy was in Costa Rica.)

The Kennys still live in Rathfarnham, on the outskirts of Dublin. A picture of them with Johnson hangs in their living room.

Last St. Patrick's Day, on one of my frequent trips to Ireland, I watched some of the Dublin parade with P. J., and then we headed for Mulligan's Pub, where we raised pints of lager to Tom Lally, Jim McLoughlin, Dapper Fallon and Jim McCloskey. They're all gone now, but 34 years ago, a "no" vote by any of them would have killed the phone call that led to a parade that is by now a grand tradition in Jersey City -- and to the adventure of a lifetime for all Irish cop named Patrick and his wife.

Gene Scanlon, a former reporter for The Jersey Journal and public relations director for Jersey City, was the city's parade chairman for 14 years.

Originally appeared in The New York Times, Sunday, March 17, 1996