Fourth Annual Italian Festival in Wildwood

The aroma and sounds of Italy will send you dancing through Fox Park, Ocean and Burke aves., Oct. 2-3 as you feast on Italian food specialties during Wildwood’s Fourth Annual Italian Festival.
Come with an appetite, because there will be a variety of Italian traditional foods, including sausage with peppers and onions, roast pork Italian style, chicken cutlet, ziti, Italian wedding soup, zeppole, and so much more to feast upon.
While walking through the park checking out all the vendors, you can listen to groups such as: Little Rocco, Buckinghams, Bandstand, 45RPM, Vito and the Salutations, Randy and the Rainbows, and a live broadcast all day Saturday from WIBG featuring Philly Bill.
Closing the festival on Saturday will be special guest, The Duprees.
Along with our food vendors the festival will also have and assortment of unique craft vendors, body art painting for the children, Italian novelties and t-shirts.
If you think you make the best meatballs in town (what self-respecting Italian cook doesn’t?), then enter them in our “Best Meatball” contest.
New this year, the contest will be held Saturday afternoon and is open to everyone. So bring those meatballs on down so we can make this contest an annual event.
The festival is hosted by the Sylvester Grande Sons of Italy Lodge, and the kick off is Friday at 5 p.m. The festival will open with a Christian mass performed by Father Fields, with processions to follow lead by Carmen Vitanza musicians.
Saturday afternoon the ERA Band and Carmen Vitanza will be singing Italian favorites.
The Sylvester Grande Lodge of Sons of Italy, in existence since 1938, is active in numerous community affairs and uses funds raised from events such as this go to programs including college scholarships for area high school students, research for Alzheimer’s, Arthritis Foundation, Cooley’s Anemia, and local charities.
The Sons of Italy will also have their own booth at the festival, where you can purchase their own cookbook of recipes.
Members of the lodge have compiled old time original family recipes, some going back to the beginning of the lodge, as well as its history and how the Italian families came to settle in the Wildwoods, start businesses, build with their hands to make Wildwood the resort town it is today.
The statue of Christopher Columbus on Ocean Avenue has another unique attraction—families and businesses have immortalized their names in black granite pavers. If you are interested in purchasing a paver, inquire at the Sons of Italy booth.
Before you leave Saturday, don’t forget to purchase your ticket for a chance to win $2,000 in cash prizes, because the drawing will go off before we close our festival.
This is two days of music, dancing, food, crafts, novelties, contest—everything for the whole family to enjoy.
For further information, or if you are interested in becoming a vendor, call 609-374-0016.
Ciao!