Bastille Day

Interesting fact about Bastille: after the storming of the Bastille, its main key was given to the Marquis de Lafayette who later gave it to George Washington. It can still be seen at Washington mansion at Mount Vernon.

Over 50 United States cities conduct annual celebrations Bastille Day, which is celebrated on 14 July each year.

Baltimore has a large Bastille Day celebration each year at Petit Louis in the Roland Park area of Baltimore City.

Boston has a celebration annually, hosted by the French Cultural Center for 40 years. The street festival occurs in Boston’s Back Bay neighborhood, near the Cultural Center’s headquarters. The celebration includes francophone musical performers, dancing, and French cuisine.

Chicago has hosted a variety of Bastille Day celebrations in a number of locations in the city, including Navy Pier and Oz Park. The recent incarnations have been sponsored in part by the Chicago branch of the French-American Chamber of Commerce and by the French Consulate-General in Chicago.

Dallas’s Bastille Day celebration, "Bastille On Bishop", began in 2010 and is held annually on 14 July in the Bishop Arts District of the North Oak Cliff neighborhood, southwest of downtown just across the Trinity River. Dallas’ French roots are tied to the short lived socialist Utopian community La Reunion, formed in 1855 and incorporated into the City of Dallas in 1860.

Houston has a celebration at La Colombe d’Or Hotel. It is hosted by the Consulate General of France in Houston, The French Alliance, the French-American Chamber of Commerce, and the Texan-French Alliance for the Arts.

Milwaukee’s four-day street festival begins with a "Storming of the Bastille" with a 43-foot replica of the Eiffel Tower.

Minneapolis has a celebration in Uptown with wine, French food, pastries, a flea market, circus performers and bands. Also in the Twin Cities area, the local chapter of the Alliance Francaise has hosted an annual event for years at varying locations with a competition for the "Best Baguette of the Twin Cities."

Montgomery, Ohio has a celebration with wine, beer, local restaurants’ fare, pastries, games and bands.

New Orleans has multiple celebrations, the largest in the historic French Quarter.

New York City has numerous Bastille Day celebrations each July, including Bastille Day on 60th Street hosted by the French Institute Alliance Francaise between Fifth and Lexington Avenues on the Upper East Side of Manhattan, Bastille Day on Smith Street in Brooklyn, and Bastille Day in Tribeca. The Empire State Building is illuminated in blue, white and red.

Orlando has a boutique Bastille Day street festival that began in 2009 in the Audubon Park Garden District and involves champagne, wine, music, petanque, artists, and street performers.

Philadelphia’s Bastille Day, held at Eastern State Penitentiary, involves Marie Antoinette throwing locally manufactured Tastykakes at the Parisian militia, as well as a re-enactment of the storming of the Bastille.

Portland, Oregon has celebrated Bastille Day with crowds up to 8000, in public festivals at various public parks, since 2001. The event is coordinated by the Alliance Francaise of Portland.

Sacramento, California conducts annual "waiter races" in the midtown restaurant and shopping district, with a street festival.

San Francisco has a large celebration in the city’s historic French Quarter in downtown.

Seattle’s Bastille Day Celebration, held at the Seattle Center, involves performances, picnics, wine and shopping.

St. Louis has annual festivals in both the Soulard neighborhood and the former French village of Carondelet, Missouri which include reenactments of the beheading of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, as well as reconstructed French fur trading posts.

Source: wikipedia.org