New York Diary

Americans in the News?

I've always thought of Columbus Day as an American holiday. It's never occured to me before that it might be an Italian-American holiday, much less an Irish-American day. But during my lunch break today I ran into the Columbus Day parade on Fifth Avenue (yes, I work on Columbus Day). It was an excercise in stereotypes. The New York Department of Sanitation, I learned, has its own Pipe and Drum Corps. In this, they were not unique. Everybody not sporting some Irish flair--and I mean everybody--was decked out in red, white, and green. The New York City Police department members each wore the colors of the Italian flag around their necks. Others carried Italian flags, played Italian music, or waved banners written in Italian.

The thing is, the NYPD--or the Fire Department, or the Department of Sanitation workers, or City Hall--is no longer an exclusively Italo-Irish group (if ever it was). You look at the names (and faces) of the cops who were actually marching, and you see Fitzkewitzes and Smiths, Yens and Chins and Estradas and Coopers. Is the NYPD actually representative of the New York population? No. But it is certainly not an Italian Old Boys' Club, either. It's strange, then, that the institution (along with so many others) maintains such a strong Italian-American cultural affinity. (Though as for that, some things change: a few people were waving EU flags, especially alongside Italian flags, and several had EU patches on their clothing.)

A cool detail: I saw Justice Antonin Scalia at the parade. (He was the Marshall.)

posted by Skay @ 12:28 PM