The Patchogue Lions Club returns to host their ever-popular Main Street Fourth of July parade in the Village of Patchogue. This year’s theme is “Let Freedom Soar This Fourth of July,” and this year’s grand marshal is Vincent Liguori.
Patchogue Lions’ president and organizer of the parade, Peter J. Feehan, said Liguori’s name kept coming up during their grand marshal selection process.
“He has been involved in this club for 51 years,” Feehan said of Liguori’s service. “It became more and more obvious—through all of his contributions and everything he’s been involved in—it became clear it was time to honor Vinny for his decades of service.”
The 76th celebration will take place on Tuesday, July 4 at 10:30 a.m., starting at West Avenue and traveling east on Main Street to Rider Avenue. The reviewing stand will be set up at Capital One Bank Plaza, where they will announce the participants as they march past.
“We want to thank all those who participate in our fundraisers that back our core mission of supporting causes related to diabetes, hearing, and vision,” said Feehan. “We have sponsored guide dogs, paid for hearing aids, collected tens of thousands of eyeglasses, paid for hundreds of vision tests and eyeglasses for those in need, and even purchased three OrCams for individuals that are visually impaired.”
In addition to the causes that are part of the Lions’ core mission, they have also collected and donated over 50,000 pounds of food for the local food pantries, provided backpacks filled with school supplies for children in the Patchogue-Medford School District, supported the Cleary School for the Deaf, provided scholarships for Patchogue-Medford graduates, and supported Ronald McDonald House, local baseball and soccer programs, Angels of Long Island, the Smithtown Guide Dog Foundation, and Volunteer Eye Surgeons International.
ABOUT THE GRAND MARSHAL
Vincent Liguori was the past president of the Lion’s Club from 1984 to 1985, after being sponsored by his father, in 1972, as a second-generation Lion. He was born and raised in Patchogue and moved to Sayville 40 years ago with his wife.
His wife, Lora, is his partner in service and is also the past president of the Sayville Lions Club. She also was a charter member of the Patchogue Lioness Club.
Liguori is from a big family in Patchogue. His father was one of 13, most of which stayed in Patchogue and ran the dairy farm in East Patchogue, by the hospital. His father, Vincent Liguori Jr., was the past president from 1955 to 1956.
Liguori and the Patchogue Lions were big supporters of the Sayville Learning Center, a school that taught children with learning disabilities.
The motto of Lions International is “We Serve.”
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