It’s Beginning to Look A lot Like San Gennaro in Danbury

The lights are being hung as we speak, and history is about to be made in Danbury, CT. Well, the lights were hung, and then taken down but more on that later.

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The Galante family is working with the City of Danbury on the 1st annual San Gennaro Festival in Danbury. The Festival begins Wednesday September 7 and runs until Sunday September 11.

The Italian Festival or Feast of San Gennaro is so close that the city has begun to hang the lights already. These lights are synonymous with this event, and I'm told these are the official lights that have been hung in Little Italy for so many years.

I love this event for so many reasons, here are some:

• I live in Danbury walking distance from the festival.
• This will be fantastic for the local economy.
• I'm Italian-American, in fact, my family is from Naples. The feast of San Gennaro is named for the Patron Saint of Naples, San Januarius.
• I've never had the opportunity of attending the event in the past.
• I-95 (Ethan and Lou) will be broadcasting live from the event on the weekend.
• The food will be amazing.
• This will bring the city together at a time when we really need something to bring us closer.

This event is free to the public and organizers are expecting thousands of attendees. While you're there, you can try authentic Italian food, watch the parade of statues and see live music from The Zoo on Friday, The Dilemma on Saturday, American Pop plays Thursday night and on Wednesday night Louis and JoAnn and the Uptown band.

San Gennaro will feature beer & wine, amusement rides for the kids and laser light shows.

I think this will be a historic event for a city that was once known for creating and hosting top-notch events.

Oh, yeah, the lights. I spoke to Jimmy Galante on Monday (8/15/22) who told me early in the day that the lights were hung on Ives Street and Independence Way in Danbury, but later in the day I got another call from Galante. He said the lights were installed and then they tested the height to make sure the fire trucks could get through, and that was a success but later, they attempted to get a tractor-trailer through and the clearance was not high enough.

So, the hard-working team removed the Ives Street lights, knowing what adjustments need to be made, and they will go back up soon. The Independence Way arch by the Patriot Garage remains. Without spending a month in the weeds, there is one arch installed right now and the rest will be back soon.

P.S. The event was almost ruined by COVID-19 last year. The Galante family and Danbury officials cautiously decided to postpone it by one year, as they watched COVID numbers rise in 2021. I was deflated when I heard the news, but I'm excited again because it's right around the corner.

P.S. #2 - Tina Galante came up with "It's beginning to look a lot like San Gennaro." She texted that to me in a text, along with the photos. It's pretty catchy.

P.S. #3 - We broke this story on Instagram, because we are everywhere.