St. Rocco Feast Begins Wednesday, Brings Fun and Fireworks to Fort Lee

Are you ready for some zeppoli?

If you are—and of course you are—the 84th Annual St. Rocco’s Feast is set to kick off on Wednesday evening.

Fort Lee’s five-day festival will offer up fun, food and lots of entertainment, including fireworks on Saturday night.

• Wednesday, Aug. 7 — 6 p.m. to midnight
  Fort Lee Film Commission Presents: “In Napoli’s” own Sam Gnasso and “Double Tap” to perform. 
• Thursday, Aug. 8 — 6 p.m. to midnight
  Live entertainment with “The Great Fraud” 
• Friday, Aug. 9 — 6 p.m. to midnight
  Rock and Roll with "TAXI"
• Saturday, Aug. 10 — 5 p.m. to midnight
  Italian American entertainment with Angelo Venuto and “Voices."
  Live Firework Show!
• Sunday, Aug. 11 — Mass in honor of St. Rocco, 9 a.m. at St. Rocco Chapel on Main Street.
  Feast: 2 p.m. to midnight
  Parade: 4 p.m., Italian American entertainment with Francesca Cavalieri

Fort Lee Patch Blogger Thomas A Bennett fondly recalled the colored lights, fried snacks, and the anticipation that precedes the festival in a recent post.

The Saint Rocco Italian Italian-American Mutual Aid Society, the nonprofit that organizes the event, was formed in 1927 by a group of Italian-American immigrants from the southern part of Italy. It has organized the event in honor of its patron saint since two years after the group’s founding.

The feast was originally three days long, according to the organization, but it proved so popular that the society turned it into a five-day celebration.

The Sunday mass procession of the statue of St. Rocco through the streets of Fort Lee and down Main Street, with the statue coming to a rest at the church, is central to the event.

In the past, funds raised from the festival have been donated to “less fortunate people and organizations throughout our community, the state of New Jersey and the world,” according to the Saint Rocco Society.