Columbus Day

In celebration of Columbus Day, Baltimore will hold its 109th annual Columbus Parade at 2 p.m. Sunday.The parade, begun in 1890, is the oldest consecutively held Columbus parade in the nation, said Thomas J. D'Alesandro III, former Baltimore mayor and one of the parade's key organizers.For the first time, an open-air market featuring Italian food, crafts and a variety of Italian cultural activities will be part of the festivities. The market will be open from noon to 1 p.m. in the parking lot of DaMimmo's Restaurant, at Albemarle and Stiles streets in Little Italy.

County government offices to close for Columbus DayCarroll County government offices will be closed tomorrow for Columbus Day. Offices will reopen at 8 a.m. Tuesday.Northern Landfill and the Recycling Center will be open.Carroll County public library branches will be open, as will the county schools.Senior centers will be closed.Rosenbergs' son to speak at Western Maryland CollegeRobert Meeropol, the son of Ethel and Julius Rosenberg, who were electrocuted after being the first American civilians sentenced to death for espionage, will discuss his parents' case and his work on other political arrests at 6 p.m. Thursday in Alumni Hall at Western Maryland College.

COLUMBUS DAY was observed yesterday by the usual highly advertised "sales" and by a three-day weekend for government employees and banks. It was notable for the absence of celebration, and the reticence of even those who might wish to make a big to-do.At least the revisionist screed of the blame-mongers was less apparent this year, perhaps confident in the success of past persuasions.On the quincentennial of his New World arrival five years ago, there was an effort at homage to the opening of the Americas to European discovery by the Columbian expeditions.

WASHINGTON -- OK, you cute little lovebirds. You know who you are. Holding tongues on the mall escalator, playfully sparring over laundry detergents at the grocery store. Yeah, you. Pack it, in Romeo and Juliet. Your day is over.Now, thank God, those of us not in successful relationships can reclaim our Constitutional rights to walk down the street unimpeded by hand-holders, sit on a bus without young lovers playing tonsil hockey in front of us, and pass a store without seeing scantily clad models suggesting we surprise our mates with the Wonderbra.

IT'S been 26 years since Congress launched the Monday holiday scheme for Washington's birthday, Memorial Day and Columbus Day. At the time, it seemed a good way to ensure that Americans (particularly federal workers) would have at least three three-day weekends instead of taking these holidays on their exact calendar day.Public Law 90-363 was enacted by wide margins in 1968, with substantial support from business organizations and government employees. The House Judiciary Committee was convinced that the holidays could be observed on Monday "without doing violence to either history or tradition."

Commercial banks, most federal offices and some markets -- though not the stock exchanges -- were closed yesterday in observance of Columbus Day. Markets in Japan were closed for Sports Day, a national holiday.Trading in the Treasury bond market was light. The weekly Treasury bills auction, normally held on Mondays, will take place today.

It didn't take much to get my grandfather to announce, "I think we better get the flag out."Columbus Day was one of his favorite holiday-excuses for running up the national colors.It would have been too simple for us to have a permanent !B bracket mounted on the front porch. No, Edward Jacques Monaghan Sr. liked to rig the stone porch with ropes, then attach the flag across the front of the house, with the field to the north.His favorite banner was very large and I believe was a gift from Congressman George H. Fallon.

Here are the schedules for government offices in Carroll for Monday, Columbus Day.* County government offices will be closed Monday in observance of Columbus Day. Offices will reopen at 8 a.m. Tuesday.* County schools and the Board of Education offices will be open regular hours.* District and circuit courts will be closed.* The Northern and Hoods Mill landfills will be open.* All Carroll senior centers will be closed.* Hampstead town offices will be open.* The Manchester Town Hall will be open.

Here are the schedules for government offices in Carroll for Monday, Columbus Day.* County government offices will be closed Monday in observance of Columbus Day. Offices will reopen at 8 a.m. Tuesday.* County schools and the Board of Education offices will be open regular hours.* District and circuit courts will be closed.* The Northern and Hoods Mill Landfills will be open.* All Carroll senior centers will be closed.* Hampstead town offices will be open.* The Manchester Town Hall will be open.

GREAT BAY RACE:On your mark. Get set! Go! Schooners from up and down the East Coast will sail from Baltimore to Norfolk in the fourth annual "Great Chesapeake Bay Schooner Race" on Thursday.Will the Norfolk Rebel edge out the Bonny Rover? Or will Maryland's own Herandis take first place? Arrive about 9:30 a.m. Thursday for a "Parade of Sail" and a close-up look at all 17 boats, which will sail from Fells Point to the Inner Harbor, and then on to the Bay Bridge for the race's official start at 2:30 p.m. The race, part of "Baltimore on the Bay," a three-week celebration of the Chesapeake, ends Saturday morning in Norfolk.

Many services will not be offered Monday in observance of the Columbus Day holiday. Banks, S&Ls, post offices, federal offices and courts, state offices, MVA offices and VEIP stations will all be closed Monday. In addition, libraries in Baltimore City and Baltimore, Harford and Howard counties will not be open. For a full listing of closings, see Sunday's Baltimore Sun.

Stocks rallied yesterday to a huge comeback after suffering their worst week ever. The Dow Jones industrial average climbed 936 points - the biggest one-day gain in its 112-year history - as several countries took concerted steps to ease the financial crisis. All the major U.S. indexes rose more than 11 percent, with the Dow posting its best percentage-point gain in 21 years. The Standard & Poor's 500 index set a record for a one-day point gain and the largest one-day percentage jump since the 1930s.

Baltimore's Columbus Day celebration is planned for Sunday with a parade from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. The route is to start at Key Highway, running up Light Street, east across Pratt Street, and then into Little Italy. The events - sponsored by the Columbus Celebrations Inc. and the Office of Promotion and the Arts - are to include a wreath-laying at the Columbus Piazza on President Street at 10:30 a.m., and an Italian Street fair from 12:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. on Stiles Street.

Oct. 12, the traditional Columbus Day, is a day to reflect on the nature of celebrity. Columbus was a pirate and tyrant who sailed off and bumped into the Bahamas, had no idea where he was, and to his dying day believed he had reached the Indies. By the time he arrived in the New World, America was old news to the Vikings. They already had that T-shirt. Five hundred years before, the Vikings had been sailing the Atlantic with confidence, making new friends and influencing people. Thorvald Asvaldsson sailed to Iceland in the 10th century with his son Erik the Red, after they'd been banished from Norway for manslaughter - if you've ever been in an argument with Norwegians, you probably considered manslaughter too - and from Iceland, Erik explored the icebound island to the west, which he named Greenland, for promotional purposes.

At parades, festivals and family gatherings across the country, Columbus Day is as much a celebration of Italian-American culture as of the European discovery of the New World - a day when "everybody is Italian." Yet many people, including some Italian-Americans, may be surprised to learn that Italians and their culture were not accepted in the United States until relatively recently. When my maternal grandparents came to the United States from Italy in the early 1920s, Italians, who were one of the largest immigrant groups, were widely considered to be among the least desirable.

Art Walters wonders Your office might be closed for Columbus Day, but the Walters Art Museum is not, and it will be wrapping up its Wide Open Weekend today with free tours and Art Cart activities. Today's hours are 11 a.m.-5 p.m. The Walters is at 600 N. Charles St. For more information, call 410-597- 9000 or go to thewalters.org.

Is it legal for our employer to force us to use a vacation day when our building closes for holidays? For example, the building was closed for Columbus Day. To be paid, we had to use a vacation day. The company also said we would have to do the same if the building closes because of inclement weather. We feel we should get a paid day off instead of being forced to take these days as vacation days. I prefer to schedule my vacation time with my family. Companies have a lot of leeway here because they aren't required to offer paid days off. So minus a union contract or other employment agreement, the companies can determine freely how much paid time off their employees receive and when they use that time.

Baltimore: Transportation Part of Fort McHenry Tunnel to be closed The southbound right tube of the Fort McHenry Tunnel along Interstate 95 is set to be closed to traffic from 7 p.m. today throughout the weekend, according to state transportation officials. Maintenance crews will be making emergency road repairs. The tube is scheduled to reopen at 5 a.m. Monday. Patterson Park Rescue shelter plans pet fair Saturday A fair to highlight neglected pets in need of new homes will be held from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday at Patterson Park.

THINK OF IT as the down side of multiculturalism. Or is it the "bunk" side? Remember Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich's pithy description of multiculturalism last year? Remember the flak he caught for it? The not-so-subtle accusations that the guv - and other Republicans and conservatives - were kind of racist, if not akin to Nazis. Oh yes, the other "N" word was bandied about for quite a bit. You'd have thought Ehrlich had gone around with a "Sieg heil" here and a "Sieg heil" there, here a "Sieg," there a "heil," everywhere a ... No, he just said it was bunk.

Despite being a grape-stomping novice, Marco Reabe displayed so much enthusiasm -- and sent so much juice flying -- that he took first place in a contest at yesterday's Columbus Day festival in Little Italy. His strategy: "To stomp my feet as fast as possible," said Reabe, a customer account manager for MBNA and North Baltimore resident. "Everyone else was a little nervous," he said. "They were afraid to get into it." Yesterday, there was lots to get into in celebration of Christopher Columbus' 1492 landing in the new world.