San Gennaro Feast a smashing success

Posted

Island Park’s San Gennaro feast, which ran from Sept. 7 to 10, went off without a hitch, following a week of preparation.

“We could not have asked for better weather,” Jeanne Morrone, the festival’s spokeswoman said. “We had four perfect days. It was ideal.”

Marrone said prior to the event that she would measure success by how quickly the food ran out. The verdict? “We ran out of chicken parm, eggplant and corn on the cob,” she said, adding proudly, “There were people on Sunday asking for corn, and we had to turn them away.”

When the Herald went to print on Monday evening, the cleanup efforts were still ongoing. “We aim to leave the place cleaner than how we found it,” Morrone said. By the evening of Sept. 12, she expected that there would be no remaining trace that the festival had happened.

The festival’s opening service was led by Bishop John Barres, of the Diocese of Rockville Centre, who also led the event’s procession, frequently breaking from the parade route to speak with spectators, Morrone said.

A band of horns and drums from Our Lady of Good Counsel, an Inwood based parish, provided music for the parade, ending the march with “When the Saints Go Marching In” as the statue of St. Januarius, the festival’s namesake, was placed in a shrine on the sidewalk in front of Sacred Heart Church, where it sat for the duration of the festival (except overnight, when he was brought into the church), watching over the Island Park celebrants.