History of St. Patrick's Day

Where to begin? Perhaps with the man who started it all: St. Patrick. St. Patrick was an escaped slave who returned home to Ireland. He shared with people Christianity. He explained to people in Ireland about the Holy Trinity by using a 3 leaf clover. It is for this reason that we often associate the clover with St. Patrick’s Day. St. Patrick is believed to have died on March 17th. So, each year we celebrate St. Patrick’s day on the day of his death.

However, it wasn’t until long after St. Patrick’s time that people in the United States began celebrating his holiday. In the middle of the 19th century, during the Great Potato Famine in Ireland, many people immigrated to America. With them, they brought the tradition of St. Patrick’s Day. Yet in the beginning, the Irish were mocked for their excessive drinking and partying during mid-March. Surprisingly, what ended up changing the mockery of St. Patrick’s Day was politics. Because there were so many Irish immigrants, they used St. Patrick’s Day as a way to organize their political power. As the holiday evolved, it grew in popularity and became a source of pride for Irish-Americans.