Years before Syracuse’s St. Patrick’s Day Parade first marched down South Salina Street in 1982, the Flyin’ Column had been celebrating the Irish saint’s day by playing an annual hooley at the Hotel Syracuse.
The hotel hooleys started in 1976.
Though the venerable Hotel Syracuse generally sits idle these days, Pascale’s Catering will open the lobby and the elegant Persian Terrace on parade day this Saturday, March 13.
And of course, the Flyin’ Column will crank out the tunes from “Kelly the Boy from Killan,” a rebel song, to “Danny Boy,” the lovely lament for a loved one far away. Keep an ear out for Column... More

Samadee paused at the newspaper racks in the Empire News on Armory Square. Two dollars for The New York Times—in Canada $2.25, maybe higher in some parts of that country, and printed in Buffalo—was enough of a jolt from memories of his junior high school paper route, delivering the Great Grey Lady up and down North Broadway. But five dollars for a Sunday
edition—which he didn’t have time for when he could take that day for himself, and wouldn’t ever have time to catch up with—had become something of an indignity. He scanned the racks. Nothing about Governor David Paterson graced the cover of the New York Post, preserving the... More

Give some truth serum to John Haas prior to the Section III Class AA final, and he could tell you that the prospect of his Cicero-North Syracuse boys basketball team facing Utica Proctor in Utica’s Memorial Auditorium wasn’t exactly a fair set-up.
But the moment Anthony DelCoro’s wild 3-pointer crashed off the glass and through the net to give the Northstars a miraculous 61-60 victory and the program’s first-ever sectional title, Haas surely changed his mind.
In sports, a magic moment is magical no matter where it takes place. Still, it took a long time to get used to the fact that, after decades of boys hoops titles... More