St. Patrick's Day Amateur Hour

Every year on March 17th, parts of the world turn green in celebration of the patron saint of Ireland, St. Patrick. It’s also a day that’s commonly referred to as amateur hour as the casual drinkers come out and think they can hang with the heavy hitters, usually with unfortunate and often messy results. Many will recognize the types of festivities that occur all over the globe including huge parades, green everywhere, and an alarming number of people dressed as leprechauns. While you might be forgiven for thinking Ireland is where the party is the largest, it’s actually America that hosts the biggest celebrations. There are festivals all across the country from San Francisco to New Orleans. In Chicago, the river is dyed green and the parade through New York City sees around two million people attend every year. That’s over four times as many as Dublin. But why is this the case? We’ve taken a brief look at the history of the festival to figure out what the craic is… read more >