{"id":284523,"date":"2026-07-02T03:50:06","date_gmt":"2026-07-02T03:50:06","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/284523\/"},"modified":"2026-07-02T03:50:06","modified_gmt":"2026-07-02T03:50:06","slug":"special-celebration-marks-americas-250th-birthday-on-liberty-island","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/284523\/","title":{"rendered":"Special celebration marks America’s 250th birthday on Liberty Island"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK (WABC) — There was a special celebration on Liberty Island on Wednesday night ahead of America’s 250th birthday.<\/p>\n

Fighter jets helped kick things off by the Statue of Liberty and ABC News’ Deborah Roberts was in the lead plane.<\/p>\n

Debra OConnell, the chairman of Disney Entertainment Television, helped welcome everyone.<\/p>\n

It all led up to a spectacular light show, which was a gift from France.<\/p>\n

Disney is Celebrating America like never before, starting Friday night at 8 and then at 10, David Muir reports live from the Statue of Liberty. After Eyewitness News at 11– the final countdown is on with “Party Across America,” from Bourbon Street to the Vegas Strip to Times Square with Sam Champion as the ball drops to ring in July 4th.<\/p>\n

Coverage continues all night and as day breaks on Saturday– David Muir traces our nation’s amazing history. After a special GMA, Hometowns and Heroes goes cross-country on America’s westward expansion. Then ESPN covers Nathan’s Famous Hot Dog Eating contest and ABC News and National Geographic present the Seven Natural Wonders of America.<\/p>\n

At 5, ESPN’s SportsCenter celebrates sports stories that shaped America and after a special edition of World News Tonight– join Ryan Seacrest for “Nashville’s Star Spangled Bash.” Music’s biggest stars will perform live and one of the largest fireworks celebrations in the nation. Again– it all starts Friday night on Channel 7.<\/p>\n

———-<\/p>\n

* Get Eyewitness News Delivered<\/a> <\/p>\n

* More New York City news<\/a><\/p>\n

* Send us a news tip<\/a><\/p>\n

* Download the abc7NY app for breaking news alerts<\/a> <\/p>\n

* Download our connected TV app<\/a> <\/p>\n


Submit a tip or story idea to Eyewitness News<\/p>\n

Have a breaking news tip or an idea for a story we should cover? Send it to Eyewitness News using the form below. If attaching a video or photo, terms of use apply.<\/a><\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 WABC-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NEW YORK (WABC) — There was a special celebration on Liberty Island on Wednesday night ahead of America’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":284524,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[109111,9,11,10],"class_list":["post-284523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york","tag-109111","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-headlines","tag-new-york-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284523","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=284523"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/284523\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/284524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=284523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=284523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=284523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}