Photo: Chaiel Schaffel/WBZ NewsRadio
BOSTON (WBZ NewsRadio) — A celebration comes to a close in the North End as the annual St. Anthony’s Feast wrapped up on Sunday.
The festival dates back to over 100 years and was started as a way for the immigrant Italian community to honor the patron saint of Montefalcione, a town in Southern Italy where many trace their roots back to.
Festivities on Sunday include traditions such as the Grand Procession of Saint Anthony.
The grand procession is regarded as the highlight of the four-day feast and sees a group of devotees carrying a statue of Saint Anthony throughout the entirety of the North End for the whole day.
“For about ten hours we walk with St. Anthony on our shoulders,” one carrier said. “It’s a long day, but it’s a great day to walk.”
The statue is decorated with dollar bills and gold jewelry and is paraded around after the end of a mass service at Saint Leonard of Port Maurice Church.
The feast had no shortage of different food options, with nearly 100 vendors serving up arancini, calamari, cannoli and of course pizza.
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It also included live music, shopping vendors and carnival games galore.
“Today is an amazing day,” one festivalgoer said. “If you’ve ever been to Disney world…that’s kind of the feeling I always get.”
The final day of the feast ended up being a logistically interesting one as the date fell on the same day as move-out day for Bostonians.
However, the colliding dates weren’t a problem for the annual feast.
“Saint Anthony’s Feast has to fall on the last Sunday in August, so every eight years, or seven years it falls on Labor Day weekend,” one North End local said. “We work together. Either way people are going to move in and were still going to have Saint Anthony’s Feast.”
The “feast of all feasts” is set to return next year and take place from August 27th– 30th.
More information on St. Anthony’s Feast can be found on their website here.
WBZ NewsRadio’s Chaiel Schaffel (@CSchaffelWBZ) reports.