New York St Patrick's Day Parade 2012 Live Stream Manhattan NYC

New York St Patrick's Day Parade 2012 Live Stream Manhattan NYC

The St Patrick's Day parade in New York City starts at 11.00am on 17th March, first marches up Fifth Avenue past St. Patrick's Cathedral at 50th Street and then up past the American Irish HIstorical Society at 83rd and the Metropolitan Museum of Art at 83rd Street to 86th Street, where the parade usually finishes mid afternoon.

In the USA, the Irish Society of Boston organised what was not only the first Saint Patrick's Day Parade in the colonies but the first recorded Saint Patrick's Day Parade in the world on 18 March 1737. (The first parade in Ireland did not occur until 1931 in Dublin.) This parade in Boston involved Irish immigrant workers marching to make a political statement about how they were not happy with their low social status and their inability to obtain jobs in America. New York's first Saint Patrick's Day Parade was held on 17 March 1762 by Irish soldiers in the British Army. The first celebration of Saint Patrick's Day in New York City was held at the Crown and Thistle Tavern in 1766, the parades were held as political and social statements because the Irish immigrants were being treated unfairly. In 1780, General George Washington, who commanded soldiers of Irish descent in the Continental Army, allowed his troops a holiday on 17 March “as an act of solidarity with the Irish in their fight for independence." This event became known as The St. Patrick's Day Encampment of 1780.

Irish patriotism in New York City continued to soar and the parade in New York City continued to grow. Irish aid societies were created like Friendly Sons of St. Patrick and the Hibernian Society and they marched in the parades too. Finally when many of these aid societies joined forces in 1848 the parade became not only the largest parade in the United States but one of the largest in the world.