☞ REMEMBER: The East Harlem Giglio c. 1955

East Harlem had Manhattan's largest Italian community in the early half of the 20th century and the above photo shows that the old world community still had a presence uptown even in the mid 1950s. The festival had hundreds of men lift a massive religious monument known as a Gigli down the streets of east 106th and 108th Street up until 1971. After a hiatus of almost three decades, the festival has been brought back uptown in the past few years by Giglio Society of East Harlem which does a great job in bringing back the traditions of a once vibrant Italian community.  This year's big event will be in mid August along Pleasant Avenue and more details can be found at the organizer site: LINK.  Photo courtesy of the Giglio Society of East Harlem