# Columbus Day celebrations in the past

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/columbus-day-celebrations-in-the-past/701015>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [October 11, 2014, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/columbus-day-celebrations-in-the-past/701015 "2014-10-11T01:36:13Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![installLSC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/54ee81/32.png) [@installLSC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/installLSC)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2014, 1:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/columbus-day-celebrations-in-the-past/701015/1 "2014-10-11T01:36:13Z")

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While walking past a bank today, I realized Columbus Day is this Monday. Of course, bank and government closures are the only real sign of the holiday these days. Was there ever a time when Columbus Day was a widely celebrated holiday? What was a typical celebration like? And if it never was a major holiday, why are bank/government closures still done to this day.

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**Author:** ![tonyfop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/85f322/32.png) [@tonyfop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tonyfop)\
**Post date:** [October 11, 2014, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/columbus-day-celebrations-in-the-past/701015/2 "2014-10-11T01:43:11Z")

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Columbus Day was instituted to celebrate Italian-American contributions to the USA. It is still a big deal in areas with a large Italian American population. Here is a link to a description of the parade in NYC. [http://www.nycgo.com/events/columbus-day-parade2](http://www.nycgo.com/events/columbus-day-parade2).

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> The parade honors Italian Americans’ contributions to New York City and draws around million spectators and 35,000 marchers.