Happy Birthday Niagara Falls!
The City of Niagara Falls was incorporated on March 17, 1892 from the villages of Manchester and Suspension Bridge, which were parts of the Town of Niagara. New York State Governor Roswell P. Flower signed a bill into law forming the city. Thomas Vincent Welch who was a member of the charter committee and then a New York state assemblyman, but more importantly a second-generation Irishman, was there when the bill was signed, and responsible for asking Governor Flower to sign the bill on St. Patrick’s Day in order to give Niagara Falls a St. Patrick’s Day birthday!
Parade and Festivities (info provided by Niagara-Gazette.com)
Niagara Falls will play host to one of the biggest St. Patrick’s parties in the Buffalo-Niagara area, with an estimated 2,500 guests expected to attend the 32nd annual celebration at the Conference & Event Center, 101 Falls Street. Prior to the 5 to 10 p.m. party, the ‘World’s Shortest Parade,’ will begin at 4:45 p.m. at Old Falls Street at First Street and proceed 75 steps to the conference center.
Entertainment at the party will be provided by the Blarney Bunch and the McCarthy School of Irish Dance.
This year’s grand parade marshal is Bernard Stack of Youngstown, a local attorney who for years represented the Niagara Falls police and firefighters’ unions. He also was a prime mover in establishing the AOH here and, in the 1970s, helped organize its chartered flight tours to Ireland.
The AOH and its ladies group collecting non-perishable foods at the door with all the items donated to the Love, Heart & Soul Food Pantry, 939 Ontario Ave., Niagara Falls. Its dining room serves nearly 150 meals per day to the needy and working poor.
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