East Harlem Giglio Feast Thrills 1000s as Italians Hoist Giant Tower

Thousands of Italian-Americans and curiosity seekers of many ethnicities from near and far converged on a couple blocks of Pleasant Avenue from Thursday Aug. 6 through Sunday Aug. 9 for the annual East Harlem Giglio Feast. One of the most fascinating and boisterous of all Manhattan street celebrations, the event, through no fault of its own, remains unjustly obscure in light the of the grand heritage it upholds.

By comparison, the annual Giglio feast in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, first held in 1887, gets abundant media coverage—so much so, many people might assume it’s the only Giglio in town. Not so, though the two feasts have shared Italian roots and today, likewise share a Catholic parish name, Our Lady of Mount Carmel, their hoisting and “dancing” of their giant 70-plus-foot-tall giglio towers are distinct. In Williamsburg, the feast honors Saint Paulinus (San Paulino), while in East Harlem it’s Saint Anthony (Sant’ Antonio) who is honored.

Every decade or so it seems the East Harlem Giglio Feast gets a bit of attention—the New York Times stopped by in 2006 and 2013 – but besides the indefatigable Rao’s restaurant at Pleasant Avenue and East 115th Street, the original Patsy’s Pizza location at 2287 First Avenue at East 118th Street, and Our Lady of Mt. Carmel Catholic church on East 116th Street between First and Pleasant Avenues, there’s not much left that’s visibly Italianate today. OLMC doesn’t even offer Italian mass anymore, though Latin, English, Spanish, Polish and Haitian services are performed

This appearance is very deceptive, for the history of Italians of East Harlem, and its place the Italian-American diaspora, looms large. A few fast facts: OLMC was built in 1884 and by the 1890s East Harlem was Manhattan’s original “Little Italy.” At its 1930s-40s peak, it dwarfed its downtown cousin both in size and population. Geographically, one could speak of Italian East Harlem then as running roughly from 97th to 125th Streets and from Park Avenue to the East River, with Jews and later, more and more Puerto Ricans mixed in.

East Harlem was the birthplace of what was likely the first New York-based Mafia family, named for its leader, Corleone, Sicily-born Guiseppe “Clutch Hand” Morello. He went to federal prison for counterfeiting in 1907 and was assassinated in the Castellammarese War against various Brooklyn mob forces in 1930. A 2009 book titled “The First Family” by historian Mike Dash is as illuminating an account of Morello’s life as could be made of such an underworld figure whose legacy continued on through to Lucky Luciano, Vito Genovese, Vincent “The Chin” Gigante and many other characters familiar from newspaper headlines, magazine stories and once in a while a trial.

Little Flower

In the overworld, when Fiorello La Guardia was a Congressman, he represented East Harlem, from 1917 to 1919 and again from 1923 to 1933. A La Guardia protégé named Vito Marcontonio, who represented East Harlem in Congress from 1935 to 1937 and again from 1939 to 1951, carried this liberal Italian tradition forward. Indeed, he was practically a socialist though formally Marcantonio was a member of the American Labor Party, and never a Democrat.

A Civil Rights champion who forged strong bonds with East Harlem Blacks and Hispanics, Marcantonio died in 1954, long enough to see the old Italian neighborhood change, drastically: the Second and Third Avenue elevated subways were removed and huge public housing projects erected (Thomas Jefferson Houses, Wagner Houses) which, if a functional improvement on crowded slums for its residents, tore apart the community. Later in the 1950s, the talk of East Harlem in government hearings was about youth gangs, Italian versus Puerto Rican, and what could be done to help them.

Among non-Italian celebrities born in East Harlem were Lou Gehrig in 1903; actor Burt Lancaster in 1913, and in 1927 and 1936, Latin jazz heroes Charlie and Eddie Palmieri. Among the Italians, a future actor named Alfredo Pacino was born there in 1940 though as a boy he moved to the Bronx to live with his mother and her Sicilian parents—from Corleone.

Giglio—Lift!

The first East Harlem Giglio feast was held on East 106th Street in 1908. By the late 1970s, it was dead—the dissipation of energy that followed the Diaspora was too great— only to be resurrected in 2000. It’s been going strong ever since, with remaining Italians from the Five Boroughs, along with those from New Jersey, Long Island, and nearby upstate counties coming over. Ample, safe and relatively inexpensive parking was available at the Costco around the corner, take the 116th Street exit off the FDR, the East Harlem Giglio Society social media accounts helpfully explained.

Once arrived, visitors were in for four nights of food, kiddie rides, an Italian-American Civil Rights League information table and general festivity, including music, DJs and dancing. For those who have lived and spent much time in heavily Italian neighborhoods of Brooklyn and Queens especially, it felt like homecoming, with that distinctive mix of stoicism, exuberance, argument, warmth, comedy, cigar smoke and deafening fireworks that no one who’s experienced it can soon forget.

The procession of Saint Anthony, who was carried from inside OLMC to Pleasant Avenue and whose brown Franciscan frock was adorned with tribute dollar bills taped into the shape of “A” was one highlight.

”I feel like I’m in a Vietnam movie!” shouted one man to another as minutes of explosion and colorful smoke prepared Pleasant Avenue— and the rear of Manhattan Center for Science and Mathematics high school—for the big Sunday Giglio lift. “Yeah, pretty much,” he replied.

As for the movie which the Giglio lift most resembles, it hasn’t been made yet but it would take a Robert De Niro at his comic, physically expressive to capture the range of cane-wielding gesture, cajoling and encouragement of the #1 Capo Anthony Cappola who directs the Giglio on its shoulder-born “dance” down Pleasant Avenue while a raucous brass band blasts above it.