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-1900-
Around the turn of the century the sixth ward in Allentown was the heart of the Irish community. Most Irishmen belonged to the Immaculate Conception church (Allentown’s Oldest Catholic Church) on Ridge Avenue. In addition, on Ridge Avenue, there was a Young Men’s Temperance Society and the Hibernia Fire Company Social Club where many Irishmen belonged for social activities. We believe all of these groups had events on or around St. Patrick’s Day. However, it is said that a certain Barney McNulty stood atop the five story Belleview Apartment house at Ridge and Gordon Streets and blew his bugle every St. Patrick’s Day.

-1955 to 1973-
A committee of mostly first and sixth ward business and political leaders formed a St. Patrick’s Day Observance Society. Men such as John McHugh, his brother Joe, Francis McLaughlin, J. Raymond Cramsey, Thomas Egan and others ran the first Parade through the first and sixth wards only for at least two years. By 1958, the parade was large enough to from 12th and Hamilton Streets to the Immaculate Conception Church on Ridge Avenue. This parade ran every year except 1973 when a fuel crisis and the deaths of some of the active committee members led to the dissolution of this committee. In their heydays, this committee ran supplements in green in the Morning Call and hosted a large banquet at the Agricultural Hall to honor citizens who saluted the Irish.

-1973 to Present-
A small group of first and sixth ward citizens, attending a banquet at the Allentown Italian Club, were expressing remorse to each other that the 1973 parade was cancelled.
Among this group were Jerry Weber, Dick McGee, Jim Nolfa, Sue Flood, and Jim Spang. The group, with less than six weeks until March 17, 1973, decided to try to put a parade together. Mayor Dadonna was contacted, meetings were held, last minute invitations extended to bands and marchers. The net result was a five division parade that came down Hamilton Street with Jerry Weber, the President, Dick McGee, Vice President, Jim Nolfa, Treasurer, and Orpha Ockenhouse, as the Secretary. This new Committee called itself the “St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee.” At the same time a St. Partick’s ball was being held by the first and sixth ward oldtimers at the Harugari Hall on Gordon Street. This ball was ultimately taken over by the Parade Committee and moved to the Fearless Fire Company in the 1980’s and is still the Official ball for the parade. The committee goes on with many other the original members still belonging. Jim Spang the current president has been involved with the committee since it’s founding days in the 1970’s.

Written by Jerry Weber, the 1st President of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade Committee.

The first St. Patrick's Day Parade was held in Allentown in the late 1860's. The first reference found locally regarding St. Patrick's Day was in the Lehigh Register, a weekly newspaper, on March 20, 1866. Irish miners working at the Friedensville zinc mines were denied the day off. Not happy with the decision, they argued with their bosses and the non-Irish miners. "A drawn battle was the result," the newspaper noted. "Many were wounded by the shillelaghs, stones, and other missles used by the beligerents." As for the parade, the first account of a St. Patrick's Day Procession was in 1869. "Agreeably to our exception, last St. Patrick's Day was clear, bright and cold," the weekly newspaper noted on March 23, 1869. The Register called the Irish who participated that day Fenians. The Fenians were an Irish Revolutionary Group who took their name from the Finna. The Finna were the soldiers of a king of Irish mythology, Finn MacCumhall. The Fenians had branches in Ireland and the United States. Newspapers of the day often gave the name Fenians to any Irishman they did not care for. The details given in the paper are few. Apparently several hundred paraded to Catasaqua and Hokendauqua and then retruned to Allentown. Their arrival in town was awaited by crowds mostly women and small boys. After waiting several hours, the crowd saw them coming. "In came the Fenians, at last," the Register said, "headed by the Emaus Brass Band, the procession interspersed with drum corps and the men bedecked with Ireland's color, carrying the Irish and American flags." The account of the 1870 parade is much more complete. It began on Front Street in the city's 6th Ward, where most of the city's Irish lived. Participants gathered at 8:45am. Before they marched, they heard a speech by T.S. Emmens, an editor of the Daily Chronicle. Emmens reminded that, like them, he too had worked in the local iron mines a few years ago and he knew them as "men whose warm hearts had given him a place when the iron hand of poverty was on him." Emmens said that "between them and him was a bond of sympathy...all aliens from the old country, all seeking more room and more liberty in a land whose proudest boast was an asylum for the oppressed." The procession then marched down Front Street and up the Hamilton Street hill. At its head was the City's Coronet Band and Drum Corps and mounted Parade Marshalls. "With the green emblems of the men it made a very pretty picture," reported the Daily Chronicle. The Marchers turned around at some point and returned to the Immaculate Conception Church, where they went to Mass. After church they marched off to Catasaqua and attended a "frolic." Some of the marchers went to Hokendauqua and Coplay to join in celebrations there. The newspaper reported that the evening many returned to the city "by car," which could either mean train or horse car as the electric street car had not yet been invented.
Thanks to Frank Whelan his research and this article.

St. Patrick's birthplace was probably Roman Britain - most likely Wales, but perhaps Scotland or France. Patrick was about sixteen years old when he was abducted and enslaved by Irish marauders, under their leader, Niall of the Nine Hostages. He worked as a shepherd on the slopes of Slemish Mountain in Country Antrim. During this time he prayed to the Christian God while captive in a pagan land.

After six years an angel came to him in a dream, prompting him to escape and seek out his homeland. After travelling for more than 200 miles by foot, he was eventually given passage on a boat travelling across the Irish Sea. His first destination was Britain, but he soon settled in France.

Patrick spent twenty years of his life as a monk in Marmoutier Abbey. There he again received a celestial visitation, this time calling him to return to the land where he has been enslaved, though now with a mission as a priest and converter. Patrick was called to Rome in 432 whereupon Pope Celestine bequeathed the honour of Bishop upon him before he left on his holy mission.

Patrick and 24 of his followers arrived in Ireland in the winter of 432. In the Spring, Patrick decided to confront the high King of Tara, the most powerful King in Ireland. Patrick knew that if he had the King?s support he would be free to take God's message to the people of Ireland.

Patrick and his followers were invited to Tara by the King of Laoghaire. While he was there he plucked a shamrock from the ground and tried to explain the to the druids and the King that the shamrock had three leaves just like God had three personas - The Father, The Son and the Holy Ghost. This was called the Trinity.

King Laoghaire was very impressed and chose to accept Christianity. He also gave Patrick the freedom to spread Christianity throughout Ireland.

St. Patrick is also known to have driven the snakes out of Ireland. However, the snakes were at that time a symbol of Paganism, and it was the Pagans that were driven out.

Patrick is thought to have died sometime between 463AB and 493AD. There is a dispute as to his place of burial; the site with the strongest claim seems to be Down Cathedral, where a large slab of rock on which the word Patric is inscribed protects "the grave" of St Patrick.

Veneration of Patrick gradually assumed the status of a local cult; he was not simply remembered in Saul and Downpatrick, he was worshipped. Indeed, homage to Patrick as Ireland?s saint was apparent in the eight century AD. At this time Patrick's status of national apostle was made independently of Rome; he was claimed locally as a saint before the practice of canonisation was introduced by the Vatican. The veneration in which the Irish have held St Patrick is evidenced by the salutation, still common today, "May God, Mary and Patrick bless you".

Within the Christian calendar Patrick has long been remembered with fondness. This began as early as the ninth century AD with the Feast of St Patrick's "falling asleep" - in other words his passing on 17 March. The Book of Armagh included a note directing all monasteries and churches in Ireland to honour the memory of the saint by the celebration, during three days and three nights in mid-spring.

Fables about Patrick ridding Ireland of snakes or his use of the shamrock to explain the Trinity, still endure as part of modern St Patrick's Day folklore and custom.