Despite Final 2 Days of Rain, the Feast of San Gennaro Celebrates 100 Years

A soaking n’oreaster curtailed the crowds over the final two days of the San Gennaro Festival in Little Italy, but the only event that was actually canceled at the city’s most famous Italian American festival was the 2 p.m. procession on Saturday, Sept. 25.

But the rain did mean the festival probably fell short of its goal of attracting two million visitors for the 100-year anniversary of the feast of music, Italian-themed merchandise, and food from cannolis and empanadas to rigatoni, hot sausages and pizza. Nearly 300 vendors packed into Mulberry Street even as some closed up shop early once the rains came on Saturday and Sunday.

The Feast of San Gennaro originated in 1926 as a block party to celebrate Saint Gennaro, the patron saint of Nepal, Italy. While the religious theme is sometimes overlooked among the throngs of people, many visitors still tape money to the statue as a way to bring good fortune for the year ahead.

Before the weekend rains, business was booming for first time vendor Anthony Patti, 54, running a booth called “Rigatoni on the Run.” He said he features “delicious sauce options all made in house.” Their pasta flavors are rigatoni with tomato sauce, vodka sauce, and spicy vodka sauce with their signature homemade ricotta.

“We prepare it right in front of you. We put it in a 24 ounce cup with a scoop of fresh ricotta which is homemade ricotta with parmesan cheese.” He shared, “I’m the chef of the stand. I had a pizzeria in New Jersey for roughly 30 years called Tony’s Pizza and I sold it a few years back. I’m hoping this could blossom into something else. And you know so far so good.”

Patti needed to take some extra time to prepare on September 25 when Straus News caught up with him. “We did phenomenal last night and sold out of everything. We had to prepare a lot of sauces overnight. We start our day at like 6:30 or 7:00 in the morning. Louie starts at 4:00 in the morning.”

Daniela Davila, who runs an empanada booth at the festival said that their best sellers are chicken, meatball parmesan, and cheese empanadas. “My favorite is the spicy chicken,” she said, but noted the cool early week weather probably held down the crowds. “I feel this year business is slow,” she said she was hoping for an evening surge on Friday night. “When people get out of their jobs around five or six we always get busy.”

Twenty-four-year-old Leanna Papia was working the stand at Red Sauce Studio selling all kinds of “Italian American goodies from keychains to t-shirts to sweatshirts.” The merchandise store is associated with Growing Up Italian, which is a social media page. Papia shared that their “most popular item is a Pastina shirt for the feast, it is the San Gennaro 100-year t-shirt.”

First time San Gennaro visitors Kira, Courtney, and Victoria were enjoying some gelato. “There is so much food. I got vanilla and pistachio. It is delicious.” Victoria said they tried “‘Stretch the Mozz’, it was a bomb. We tried “I Got Balls,” it was bomb. I’m super Italian. I was like, ‘Oh, these are my peeps.’”

“It is an important event for the Italian American community, especially people from Naples where Saint Gennaro is a patron Saint,” said John Fratta, a vice president of the Feast of San Gennaro “Without Saint Gennaro, it is nothing. We look to him as the person that we honor and pray to. We are praying for no rain tomorrow,” he said, a prayer which unfortunately was not answered.

“I will stand by the statue and I watch people come over praying so devoutly to San Gennaro. One woman was crying and praying to San Gennaro to help her husband. That is the most important part of this for us.”

Fratta fondly remembered a grease pole climbing contest that was a part of the event years ago. He said, “we had a grease pole three stories high full of axle grease. We had kids from every block form a team and whichever one got to the top won the prizes.”

The vendors set up their booths early in the morning around 5 a.m. The personal preparation process for each booth also takes a long time because it involves food preparation.

On Friday, Fratta mentioned that the cleanup process is even more complex because of the sheer scale of the event. Fratta said, “the city wants everything down by 9 o’clock in the morning on Monday.”

Fratta mentioned that they asked the city for a longer allowance for takedown time because of the storm but the request was denied. He said, “We are a not-for-profit, and we are a religious not-for-profit. We are holding money for the church around the corner because they are in bad shape, and we are hoping to give them a nice check.

The church of Most Precious Blood on Baxter Street is where the statue of San Gennaro rests when it is not on display. But the church no longer has its clergy and rumors that the Archdiocese might sell it off have circulated for years. “Last year we gave them a $100,000 check,” Fratta said. “We wanted the money to be used for the church.” But he said the Archdiocese has been difficult to deal with. He said he hopes to raise a similar amount this year.

The weather took a turn for the worse on Sunday and the streets were empty compared to the packed and bustling event two days earlier. Arcangelo Volpe works at Il Cortile Ristorante in Little Italy. “We lost a lot of business,” he said.

“We usually have a lot of tourists coming in but today we did not have that. A lot of people suffer...It is not easy because we have 50 people who work in this place,” he said, pointing to a deserted outdoor dining area that could seat 50 people. “You need the money to pay everything to keep these people working.”