‘The thing that makes Dublin special’: Small Texas town prepares for thousands of visitors ahead of St. Patrick’s Day celebrations
Editor’s note: The following event has been postponed due to inclimate weather.
DUBLIN, Texas (KTAB/KRBC) – Seas of green will be present this weekend for Saint Patrick’s Day on Sunday, and nobody does it perhaps quite as well as small-town Dublin, Texas.
Schedule of events: Dublin’s annual Shamrock Festival 2024
Although Dublin’s been named since the mid 1800s, it wasn’t always spelled the way we now know it to be.
Ben Pate, president of the Dublin Historical Society told BigCountryHomepage.com, “The settlers here had the double in their wagons, and that’s where we got the name ‘double in,’ and later on they said, ‘well, why don’t we just go ahead and spell it like Dublin- Dublin, Ireland?'”
Pate also said it was an early entreprenuer who sent a letter to Dublin, Ireland, asking for a list of city street names and their spellings so that they could lean into the Dublin effect full force.
“That’s why we have Patrick Street and Sackville, Camden Street,” listed Pate.
The Dublin Chamber of Commerce revealed that the town hailed itself as the unofficial “Irish Capital of Texas” since the 1930s, and in 2005 that sort of cognomen was actually made official by the Texas House of Representatives.
Dublin, Texas has had a ‘Shamrock Festival’ to honor St. Patrick’s Day for generations now.
“Growing up here, it was always, as a child, the carnival,” Nancy Williams, a longtime resident and member of the Dublin Chamber of Commerce said. “We are working on getting larger and larger carnivals.”
Pate encouraged, “This is the thing that makes Dublin special.”
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With thousands of visitors expected on Saturday in a town made up of only about 3,400 residents, Kourtney Warner, also with the Dublin Chamber of Commerce, said the Shamrock Festival is the city’s biggest fundraiser of the year.
UPDATE: The Dublin Chamber of Commerce announced Friday afternoon that festivities must be postponed until further notice due to inclimate weather. Follow that link to learn more.
“We’ve kind of struggled in recent years. Our Dr. Pepper plant closed, and that was kind of a big draw to get visitors in, and so we’re kind of building that back up… So we see a lot of our businesses get a lot of benifit from those days [leading up to festival],” explained Warner.
Local business owner Danielle Meador at the Wicked Clover, a tattoo parlor along the Shamrock Fest parade route, said she and her artists look forward to the event and meeting new people. The Wicked Clover even offers a flash sale on clover and generally Irish themed tattoos around St. Patrick’s Day.
“Me and Jess, one of our other artists, are going to be doing pictures and face painting for free down at Wright Park (W.M. Wright Historical Park), just to promote the shop and interact with the little kids and such,” Meador shared. “Trying to take the stigma off of tattoo shops, y’know.”
With this being her seventh Shamrock Festival, Meador encouraged visitors to try everything the city offers, “Eat that authentic Irish food, and it’s just fun. Bring your kids, have a ball.”
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Dublin’s Shamrock Festival will have nearly 20 different attractions on Saturday, starting with a Shamrock Shuffle 5k at 7:30 a.m., and continuing throughout the day with a parade, entertainment, a softball tournament, markets, plenty of food, an Irish stew cook-off, and more.
“They all prepare weeks and months in advance. Ordering extra inventory, things to support St. Patrick’s Day,” added Williams.
The City of Dublin also said safety is at the forefront of mind this year. So, a shuffle between downtown and park events will be offered.
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