2022 – Bergenfield, NJ’s, St. Patrick’s Day Parade
(ignore April 30, 2017 publish date – this was published on March 17, 2022)
I grew up in Teaneck, which is right next to Bergenfield, so it’s a pretty familiar place.
For the last 40 years – minus the two Covid years – Bergenfield has had a St. Patrick’s Day Parade (and they resumed this past Sunday). I had never attended it…………..not that Irish, I guess, but I did want to get some interesting photos, but without having to stand in the sun for hours amongst hundreds of people cheering for passing fire trucks from multiple towns.
Plus, I didn’t have a whole afternoon to spend………..maybe a half-hour or an hour. So I decided to go backstage. Oops! Old habits (and sayings) die hard………….I meant go to the staging area, where all the various groups gather to get ready to step off.
Lots of streets were blocked off, but I knew a back way to avoid that. I parked about a block away from where parade participants were grouped and headed up the street.
Ah! Here’s a great vehicle: it’s all Irished-up and has QQ plates (historic). AND there’s a gentleman in Irish band garb to add the proper flavor to the shot:
When I first saw it, the green-hatted figure on the roof was upright. No such luck now. Perhaps he just got back from a St. Paddy’s Parade pub crawl. Maybe I should see if I can revive him upward:
Nope.
At that moment, a group of glittery, golden-sheathed young ladies and ebony-attired young men in band hats came around the corner, heading who knows where:
A blue and white car is full of green as the man in the Irish band garb heads up to South Washington Avenue – the parade street:
No – it doesn’t say “drunken”……….it’s Junkin and I’m trying to figure out where this truck would fit in the parade. Oh, I know! Attach a big scoop to the front and keep it right behind the horses. What’s that? There are no horses in this parade?
If anyone wants to see northjersey.com’s parade coverage:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XURL-_KgdP0&t=3106s
I saw the live stream from home as I edited the staging area photos. I’m glad I did this the way I did because it saved a lot of time. There was at least a block of empty space between most of the parade participants – too much dead air.
One thing the video showed me was that there were TWO Junkin trucks – a parade within a parade! The coverage didn’t show what was in front of them, but a bunch of little kids followed the trucks.
Back at the staging area, I started walking around. On the next block, I saw some police motorcycles lined up curbside.
(Note: from this point on, ALL photos are panoramic shots. Click to enlarge and hit your back button to return.)
“Can I take a shot of them?”
“Sure.”
Click!
I don’t know where the officers were going, but it looks like they were heading for the Village Laundromat:
Just down the street from them (and in front of the same long building), a large group of about 60 Bergenfield High School Marching Band members gathered:
To their right (and inside a parking lot) were the BHS Color Guard, which I believe preceded the band in the parade:
I’ve gotta capture those twirls right:
Much better:
I thought I had photographed the whole band earlier, but when I turned around after shooting the Color Guard, I saw about 15 MORE band members (and their truck):
You can see part of the original 60 I already photographed on the far right under the building overhang.
I didn’t see much else to shoot, so I retraced my steps back. When I got back up the street where the police bikes were, they seemed to already be posing for someone, so I asked if I could take a panoramic shot of them all and this is the result (and last picture I took that day):
I noticed that one of the bikes said “Fort Lee” on it. It turns out they were ALL from Fort Lee.
I’m going to send them a full-sized file of this shot because I feel somewhat indebted to them.
Why?
Twenty-five years ago, on the day of my mother’s funeral, the cortege had left the funeral home in Teaneck and started heading for the funeral Mass in Hackensack.
There was a slight detour that I didn’t know about in advance as the cars turned into the driveway of the Teaneck Municipal area. The first building we went by was the Teaneck Police Department. Every cop was lined up in front of the building and stood at attention while saluting my mother (she worked for years in the Violations Bureau and every cop knew and loved her).
We then passed the Municipal Building and all of the employees were lined up outside. They had been given the morning off in case any wanted to attend the Mass and burial.
As we got back on the street to Hackensack, there was another surprise honor. My cousin, C.J. Mulligan, was THE Teaneck motorcycle cop. For his beloved aunt, he arranged for motorcycle cops from other towns to help him escort the cortege.
From our car, I could only make out the town name on one of the motorcycles:
Fort Lee!
This picture alone tells me I made the right decision to skip the parade and spend a half-hour shooting in the staging area.
Maybe I’ll do it again next year.
Please post Fort Lee’s response to receiving their picture. Probably none will remember Mom. I’ll send this to John Mulligan to get to CJ, I hope.
I haven’t heard from anyone in Fort Lee.
Aloha Bob! Thanks for the coverage of “The Old Country” (that’s New Jersey for me). Recognized some of the backgrounds. Your mom was an icon in Teaneck. The escort and ceremony were well deserved. Not sure if you and your family ever heard this but on C.J.’s first day on the job out of the police academy he was riding with Rich Kilmurry (Killer) and they pulled over a car that had run a stop sign. Kilmurry sent C.J. to do the stop and write the ticket. C.J. came back to the police car a few minutes later and had obviously not given the driver a summons. Killer asked what was the problem and C.J. answered that he could not give the women a ticket because “she looks just like my Aunt Eunice”, your mom. Justice.
Bob, thanks for the memories from your many photos. I made my living on the road in the biz for most of the late 70’s and into the 80’s. Great years for music on the east coast.
Aloha
Thanks Geri for sending this on to me.