St. Patrick’s Day in Kansas City

It’s a rainy day in Kansas City on this St. Patrick’s Day. Did you know that Kansas City has one of the largest St. Patrick’s Day parades in the United States? This will be it’s 35th year, in fact.

However, it’s “raining on their parade”, so to speak. Thunderstorms are the theme of the day and it doesn’t show any sign of clearing up. Have no idea how the parade went (it was supposed to go from 11:00 am – 1:00 pm.

I remember St. Patrick’s Day in Chicago. Probably everyone knows that the Chicago River turns green every year on St. Paddy’s Day and has done so for the past forty years! But what you probably don’t know is why the river turns green or how it turns green.

Here’s the story. And it’s true. As he was walking down a Chicago street, a plumber was approached by a man named Stephen Bailey. The plumber was wearing white coveralls and they were stained a beautiful shade of green – a perfect emerald green, in fact.

Turns out that it was caused by a stain that plumbers use to detect leaks in the pipes that empty into the Chicago River. The stain starts out orange and turns green. What’s interesting is that when the dye is dumped into the river it turns the water orange – bright orange! Then, like magic, it turns the entire river green. Bright emerald green. Perfect for St. Paddy’s Day.

There are tons of St. Patrick’s Day traditions in almost every city in the country. I’ll do some “homework” and next year I’ll have something post on this holiday!