Rolling Rally Around the Irish Flag in Canton at Irish Fest

Day two of the massive l drew large crowds.  The rolling rally in Boston celebrating the added to the excitement and drew in fans as well. , the nation’s premiere U2 cover-band, headlined on the main stage.

Not far away, under the Irish Pub’s stage tent, several of Massachusetts’ finest bands wooed the crowd with Irish tunes of contemporary and classic origin.  The Ha’Penny band from Holyoke drew crowds by playing a diverse selection of tunes in both Gaelic and English.

In the most quaint of settings, a duo of musicians called The Locals sang and played guitar and pipe acoustically to an intimate audience at The Traditional Irish Cottage. A group of young children danced together in front of the band, enjoying the tunes.

Undoubtedly, the most spectacular event of the day was the unfurling of the largest Irish flag in America, which spanned the length of a football field and took 50 people to carry it up towards the main stage.  A  rare, similarly sized American flag was joined in the procession, to symbolize the mutual love between the two countries and people.  Both the Irish national anthem and the American national anthem were sung after the procession. 

Massachusetts State Senator Tom Kennedy of Brockton thanked the crowd for their patriotism and highlighted the friendship of the Irish and American communities.

As the day progressed, the crowds from Boston spilled into Canton for one of the biggest festivals of the year.  However, at the printing of this story, the crowds were well-mannered and no trouble at all for Canton Police.

“The crowd is absolutely fine,” Canton Police Officer Brady said.  “Every one is behaving, like they always do at this event.  And we have great weather, too!”