Columbus Day parade will kick off at noon Monday

The Joint Civic Committee of Italian Americans will hold its 71st annual Columbus Day parade Monday in the Loop.

The parade will step off at noon at State Street and Wacker Drive and proceed south to Van Buren Street.

Antonia Bennett, daughter of famed Italian American singer Tony Bennett, will serve as the parade’s grand marshal, according to the The Joint Civic Committee of Italian Americans, which holds the parade. Tony Bennett died in July at age 96.

“This will be the biggest and best parade we have ever had,” Ron Onesti, the group’s president, wrote in a statement. “We will be saluting Tony Bennett as his daughter Antonia will be joining us as Honorary Grand Marshal. It is exciting!” 

The day’s events will begin at 9 a.m. with a Mass at The Shrine of Our Lady of Pompeii, 1224 W. Lexington St., followed by a wreath-laying ceremony honoring Italian American Veterans across the street at Arrigo Park. 

For the first time, a pre-parade rally has been scheduled. It starts at 11:45 a.m. at State and Wacker, and will feature speeches from local and visiting dignitaries, according to parade organizers.

The parade returned to downtown in 2021 after a two-year absence and has largely returned to its pre-pandemic size, Pasquale Gianni, president of Avanti, the young professionals organization of the Joint Civic Committee, told the Sun-Times last year.

Last year, marching alongside longtime Columbus Day parade participants like the Knights of Columbus and the Italian-American Executives of Transportation were the Filipino-American Society of South DuPage, the traditional Mexican dance troupe Ballet Folklorico, and the Wat Dhammaram Academy of Thai Classical Music.

“That’s as it should be, a celebration of the immigrant experience in America,” Gianni said, noting that a bill passed in 2017 made the last Monday in September Indigenous Peoples’ Day in Illinois.

“There are 364 other unoccupied days on the calendar to celebrate, there is no reason that you have to step on the back of one group to elevate another group,” Gianni said.