[BN] Chronicles: A century of Italian festivals in Buffalo

As long as there have been Italians in Buffalo, newspapers have been writing about Italian festivals. Each Italian Catholic parish or transplanted Italian community often held many religious-based celebrations and festivals that mirrored those celebrated back in Italy.

In the neighborhood that stood in the area now known as Canalside – but then known as “The Hooks” or, generally, Canal Street (which was later renamed Dante Place), the 1926 celebration of St. Joseph of Bagheria’s feast day was highlighted by a procession of more than a thousand people. Mass and veneration at Mount Carmel church were at the core of the celebration, but the Buffalo Courier described children who “ducked from the crowded apartments of tenement houses, gleefully braved the rain to purchase from the many stands delectable Italian confections or other delicacies – some in the guise of American hot dogs.”

Before City Hall was built, and when the neighborhood immediately to the west of Niagara Square was thriving, St. Anthony’s was another hub of activity. The Buffalo Commercial reported on the celebration of the “Festa Madonna Della Aussunta,” the Feast of the Assumption:

“The Italians of Buffalo are celebrating in the same manner as their countrymen over on the shores of the Mediterranean – with feasting and fireworks and general rejoicing.”

The Buffalo Courier’s description of the 1922 Madonna of the Bridge celebration at the foot of Court Street sounded a lot like what Buffalonians will see at this weekend’s Italian Festival on Hertel Avenue.

“Gayly deck booths, from which floated shrill cries of vendors, were scattered everywhere. In avenues between the booths a restless, merry throng meandered back and forth, laughing and gesticulating,” the Courier reported.

It was the flavor of those old-time festivals that the organizers of the first modern Italian Festival were trying to bring back to…