SEE THE MAP: The Village of Wellsville has approved the parade permit for March 17
Allegany County Ancient Order of Hibernians will host with Wellsville Chamber
Images of the St. Patrick’s Day Parade in Dublin Ireland courtesy of Brian Cannon
Save the date, or at least a few minutes of it, to come to Main Street in Wellsville, NY to enjoy and view the Allegany County Ancient Order of Hibernians (AOH) First Annual “ Shortest Saint Patricks Day Parade. The Village of Wellsville approved to local AOH Division’s application at their February 13th Village Board Meeting for a parade permit to close down the center block of Wellsville where Eaton Court intersects with main Street in there heart of the Business District. The block will be closed for approximately a half hour to allow the parade units to form at 4:15 pm and the parade will then line up and travel approximately 12 feet from the south end of Eaton Court intersection with Main Street to the North side of Eaton Court intersection with Main Street.
AOH Chairman Brian Cannon stated that “Wellsville and Allegany County needed a local Saint Patricks Day parade of our own to showcase and celebrate our area’s widespread Irish heritage and celebrate Saint Patrick the Patron Saint of ireland. March 17th is a national holiday in Ireland and the they celebrate Saint Patrick through the week following March 17th. We wanted to have a family friendly, fun event in Wellsville that will bring people into downtown where the restaurants, shops (Including Harts Irish Store!), Wellsville Brewing and our local pubs will be open. We will be working with Bruce Thomas and the Chamber of Commerce to further expand publicity on this event to help our local businesses. Our local ELKs lodge is also having a Corned Beef & Cabbage Dinner from 5-7 PM at the lodge with Irish Music and Dancing to follow so there will be lots to do in Wellsville on march 17th this year!”
Cannon also stated: “ We will make an announcement in the near future about more parade details including Grand Marshall(s) of the parade, line up order but as in any Saint Pats Day parade you must have something green on or risk being pinched by a leprechaun! We have commitments from a few local organizations to March in our Parade and I will be in contact with Wellsville High School to see if we can get the local Band to march as well as few local Bagpipers. We will have an announcer and sound system set up top announce the participants and leprechauns in the parade.
“Our AOH Division would like to thank Mayor Randy Shaylor, The Wellsville Village Board, Wellsville Police Department (Garda in ireland) and the Village of Wellsville DPW for their support in making this event possible and happen in downtown Wellsville” says Cannon. “We hope to have a green start line and a green finish line across main street and it looks like a 12 foot long parade route which is considerably shorter than Hot Springs, Arkansas’ 98 foot parade route. We will be documenting, notarizing and recording the parade and the 12 foot parade route as we will tray to submit to the Guiness Book of World records-our 12 foot parade route should be hard to beat” We also hope to have the Emeralds Hook & ladder Truck lead the end of the Parade and Green cars, convertibles and Trucks are welcome to join the festivities! Yes Buffalo has 2 great Saint Patricks day parades and they are long. Hornell always has a great Saturday parade but its a long parade route. New York City has an all day parade that goes on for miles and Dublin Ireland has a 2.5 kilometer parade route that last all day that my wife Marlee and I saw in 2008-it was huge and I suspect if it was snowing or raining it would tough to be in the parade or watching it. Our parade will be short and bring a green umbrella or green hat if its cold and raining or snowing-it will go quickly!”
For more information on participating in the Allegany County AOH’s ‘Shortest” Parade on March 17th contact Brian Cannon at aohcannon@gmail.com and look for more updates on the Allegany County Ancient order of Hibernians facebook page https://m.facebook.com/wellsvilleAOH/events Remember on march 17th that Everyone is Irish!
