March 6, 2002 – The 33rd annual St. Patrick’s Day parade and celebration will bring a lot of green and cheer to the historic streets of downtown Christiansted on Saturday, March 16.
The parade will feature scratch and steel-pan music, a colorful entourage of floats, jubilant Irish descendants and plenty of green. The procession will depart at 11 a.m. from the Christiansted Wharf and Hospital Street area and follow a route up Company Street and back down King’s Street to the wharf area.
In addition to the traditional Irish theme, the parade will be full of patriotic undertones this year.
Following the parade, a block party will be held on Church Street, in the wharf area. Food and drink, including local delicacies and traditional corned beef and cabbage, will be available.
Proceeds from the parade and party will go to local charities.
St. Croix's St. Patrick’s Day parade began in 1969 when a group of local businessmen convened in Harry’s Office Bar on Queen Cross Street in Christiansted for a "cool one," according to a release from the V.I. Tourism Department. The conversation turned to holidays and why St. Patrick’s Day wasn’t celebrated in the Virgin Islands when so many other holidays were and so many families were descendants of Irish overseers. Within minutes, the first St. Patrick’s Day parade was formed.
Without further ado, a stakebed truck was commandeered, a piano put atop and the newly organized committee and fellow supporters were aboard singing Irish songs and saluting shoppers and shopkeepers who came out to see what all the noise was about.
And so, the first St. Patrick’s Day parade happened on St. Croix, and the parade is still going strong 33 years later.