{"id":166478,"date":"2026-03-17T18:54:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-17T18:54:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/166478\/"},"modified":"2026-03-17T18:54:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-17T18:54:07","slug":"estimated-2-million-brave-cold-for-nycs-st-pats-parade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/166478\/","title":{"rendered":"Estimated 2 million brave cold for NYC&#8217;s St. Pat&#8217;s Parade"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>New York is shamrocking and rolling.<\/p>\n<p>An estimated 2 million St. Patrick\u2019s Day partiers braved the cold to paint the Big Apple green for its <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/03\/17\/us-news\/millions-of-nyers-celebrate-their-irish-heritage-at-nycs-st-patricks-day-parade-check-out-the-fun\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">265th annual Irish parade<\/a> Tuesday \u2014 with droves keeping warm by knocking back a few Guinnesses.<\/p>\n<p>Dennis Dunn of Yonkers was one of many revelers who kicked off the day\u2019s festivities with a beer and Irish breakfast at Connelly\u2019s before making their way to the Fifth Avenue in Manhattan to watch largest Irish parade in the world.<\/p>\n<p>Dennis Dunn of Yonkers proudly paints his face with the colors of the Irish flag for the festivities Tuesday.  REUTERS<\/p>\n<p>Dunn, 62, even coated his face with the green, white and orange colors of the Irish flag and wore a green t-shirt covered in pins related to the motherland for the occasion.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSaint Patrick\u2019s Day is about Irish tradition, and my tradition is coming to the parade and getting all dressed up,\u201d Dunn told The Post.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAfter the parade, we are going to head home and have lunch and have corned beef for dinner. Well, we will have some Guinness, some beers.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Jim Burke, 60, dyed his beard green for the fete \u2014 which he typically marches in but decided to spend this year\u2019s holiday as an observer.<\/p>\n<p>A parade-goer wears her Irish pride all over her face Tuesday. REUTERS<\/p>\n<p>Jim Burke shows off his dyed green beard green. Estrella McDaniel \/ NY Post<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI\u2019ve been to a zillion of these parades and usually love marching in them being apart of the community,\u201d Burke said.<\/p>\n<p>About 150,000 people marched in the parade, including Irish step dancers, bagpipers and the <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/02\/06\/us-news\/new-archbishop-hicks-installed-at-nycs-st-pats-with-historic-tradition\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">newly minted Archbishop of New York, Ronald Hicks.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The total crowd estimate was put at around 2 million, similar to past years.<\/p>\n<p>Everyone\u2019s Irish on St. Paddy\u2019s Day. Aristide Economopoulos for NY Post<\/p>\n<p>This year\u2019s grand marshal was<a href=\"https:\/\/www.nycstpatricksparade.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\"> Bob McCann<\/a>, co-chair of NewEdge Capital Group and owner of Forest Creek Golf Club in North Carolina.<\/p>\n<p>McCann, whose ancestors hail from County Armagh on the Emerald Isle, was <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2025\/03\/16\/us-news\/nyc-st-patricks-day-parade-to-be-led-by-retired-carpenter-and-grandpa-from-queens\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">plucked to lead the event<\/a> because of his three decades of service as a board member of New York City\u2019s Irish Arts Center, where he advocates for a strengthened cultural and civic relationship between Ireland and the US.<\/p>\n<p>New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan celebrates his Irish heritage in style \u2014 with a stogie.  Aristide Economopoulos for NY Post<\/p>\n<p>An estimated 2 million people flock to the Manhattan parade Tuesday. Erik Pendzich\/Shutterstock<\/p>\n<p>All 32 counties of Ireland are represented at the annual event. Aristide Economopoulos for NY Post<\/p>\n<p>The president of the County Armagh Association made the trek from Ireland and marched alongside McCann and thousands of other proud Irishmen and women.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis parade is made up of the counties of Ireland that are here in America, all 32 are here,\u201d said President Kathleen Keegan Mattessich, 79.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis parade is heritage. We\u2019re representing our country here and there in Ireland.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Alison McDermott said she made the trip from Ireland to experience the parade for the first time.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis has been a great atmosphere, absolutely brilliant. Just lovely to see so many Irish connections,\u201d said McDermott, 45.<\/p>\n<p>Kathleen Keegan Mattessich, president of the County Armagh Association, marches in the parade.  Estrella McDaniel \/ NY Post<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy favorite tradition would definitely be drinking \u2026 Guinness. That\u2019s how we socialize in Ireland, by drinking and chat[ting] with friends and family.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>For many attendees, the annual parade gives them the chance to form connections with not only fellow Irish New Yorkers but lads and lassies from across the globe.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe parade really brings you back to your roots, and you really run into people that maybe you haven\u2019t seen, and it also just makes you very proud to be Irish,\u201d said Eileen Arrington, 59, who has attended the St. Pat\u2019s Parade every year.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI just love the marching and seeing people and just feeling like the community has come together with everything that\u2019s going on in the world. It\u2019s nice to just have a day,\u201d Arrington said, adding that her favorite Irish tradition is \u201cdancing.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New York is shamrocking and rolling. An estimated 2 million St. Patrick\u2019s Day partiers braved the cold to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":166479,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[30210,75,57,9,24,197,56,63,65,64,273,46080,58],"class_list":["post-166478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-ireland","tag-manhattan","tag-metro","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-life","tag-ny","tag-nyc","tag-nyc-headlines","tag-nyc-news","tag-parades","tag-st-patricks-day","tag-us-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=166478"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/166478\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/166479"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=166478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=166478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=166478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}