St. Patrick's Day History By Mallory O’Donnell   Does anybody really know why we celebrate St. Patrick's Day? On St. Patrick's Day everyone wears the infamous color green; and if they don't, they get pinched by their friends. Some people who don't wear green make excuses like, “Oh, I've got green in my wallet!” or, “I have green on my boxers!” but still we pinch them. St. Patrick's Day is celebrated all over the world on March 17 in honor of St. Patrick. On this day in Ireland, Irish families normally attend church in the morning and celebrate in the afternoon. Many people eat, drink, and dance. The traditional meal on this day is corned beef and cabbage in America because American Irish immigrants made corned beef instead of bacon to save money, but in Ireland they eat Irish bacon and cabbage.   Just like Thanksgiving and Christmas, there is also a St. Patrick's Day parade. Actually, the first St. Patrick's Day parade was in the United States, not in Ireland. In the first parade, Irish soldiers in the English military marched through New York City on March 17, 1762. The bagpipe is a traditional Irish instrument that was played during the parade. Several aides like the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick would help put on parades for this holiday. In 1848, many of the New York Irish aides formed one big St. Patrick's Day parade. That parade today is the world's most civilian parade and the largest in the United States. Over 150,000 people attended. St. Patrick's Day is considered mostly a religious celebration. Once in the 1970s, Irish laws dictated that the pubs be closed on St. Patrick's Day. But in 1995, the Irish government started a national campaign to use the holiday for the world to see Ireland and to learn about Irish culture.  Most immigrants in Ireland came to America because of the potato famine. In 1845, a disease infected the potato crop all over Ireland. Potatoes were a main source of their food. Almost a million poor and uneducated Catholic Irish came to America to get away from starvation. Most of the immigrants went to the northeast, where New York and Boston are. When the St. Patrick's Day parade was celebrated and Irish Americans attended, many newspapers depicted them in cartoons as drunk, violent monkeys. The Irish flag is divided into three vertical rectangles, and the colors of the flag are orange, green, and white. One of the main symbols of St. Patrick's Day is the four-leaf clover. It's really hard to find one, but if you do you're said to have luck. Music is a main part of St. Patrick's Day. Some famous Irish bands you might know are The Clancy Brothers and The Chieftains. The instruments they use are the fiddle, bagpipe, flute, and bodhran. The river dance is a very difficult dance and is traditional in Ireland. Children as well as s perform the dance. When they dance, they wear what sound like wooden shoes but are just leather shoes with a buckle and a heel. s wear Celtic dresses with long knee socks, and they normally curl their hair. Boys normally wear black pants and a white shirt. Everyone talks about whether leprechauns are real. Leprechauns are fairies or tiny men who can use their powers for good or evil. Everyone says you can find them at the end of a rainbow with a pot of gold, but is that really true? Actually, leprechauns had nothing to do with St. Patrick's Day until in 1959, when Walt Disney released a movie which then made leprechauns known as a famous Irish symbol. One thing is for sure:  Everyone becomes a little Irish on St. Patrick's Day and enjoys the celebrations no matter where they are!