Community Corner
Show Patch Your St. Patrick's Day Green!
If you are celebrating the Irish Holiday this weekend, show your green, or we might have to pinch you.
St. Patrick's Day is a widely celebrated holiday in the United States. It's a day where everybody is Irish, regardless of heritage, so show us how you are celebrating St. Patrick's Day by clicking the "add photos and video" button attached to this article.
Here are a few tidbits about St. Patrick's Day you might not have known.
Fun Facts
History behind the Holiday
St. Patrick wasn’t Irish
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The man whom the holiday honors was born in Britain in the third century. He was kidnapped as a teenager and taken to Ireland, where he was enslaved and forced to work as a shepherd. He eventually escaped, and returned home, but legend says he heard a heavenly voice commanding him to return to Ireland and convert the people to Christianity.
There were never snakes in Ireland
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Legend credits St. Patrick with banishing snakes from Ireland by chasing them into the sea after they assailed him during a 40 day fast. However, all evidence suggests that Ireland never had any snakes because, as an island, snakes were unable to migrate across open ocean.
First St. Patrick's Day held in New York, not Ireland
Colonial New York City hosted the first official St. Patrick's Day parade in 1762, when Irish immigrants in the British colonial army marched down city streets to reconnect with their Irish heritage.
St. Patrick's Day: a minor religious holiday in Ireland
St. Patrick's Day did not become a national holiday in Ireland until 1903 and the first parade wasn't held in Dublin until 1931. It was originally a minor religious holiday, where a Catholic priest would acknowledge the feast day and families would celebrate with a big meal.
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