In “Gotham,” their landmark history of New York City, Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace chronicle how Italian street festivals emerged in Harlem as a boisterous response to marginalization. Confined to the basement of the Church of Our Lady of Mount Carmel on 111th Street, the church their laborers had built, the Italian immigrant community took to the street to honor their Madonna, their irrepressible religious fervor bursting forth in games and costumes, bands and food.
Hoboken’s Italian Catholics were never so sidelined as their New York compatriots, receiving their own church, St. Francis, as early as 1889, but their celebrations unfolded in much the same manner.
First held in 1910 to honor the patron saint of Hoboken’s second Italian church, the St. Ann’s Italian Festival has grown to become a staple of the city and the North Jersey Italian community, filling the streets of the Third Ward each July.
Carlo Davis may be reached at cdavis@hudsonreporter.com.