Bastille Day Bash – Biggest Yet in New York City
Last Sunday, July 15, the Greater New York Citroën and Velosolex Touring Club held their 15th annual Bastille Day Celebration and it proved to be their biggest so far!
They gathered at 9 a.m. at Grant’s Tomb on Riverside Drive at 122nd Street. From there the group toured through Manhattan to 60th Street at Fifth Avenue, where they stopped to display their vehicles at the Bastille Day fair of the French Institute Alliance Française.
Howie Seligmann, co-founder and organizer of the sponsor group, the Greater New York Citroën and Velosolex Touring Club, said the event was so successful that they might be transmitting the Rally live to Japan next year!
The NY times did a great article and video on the Bastille Day activities that you can view here:
Also check out these links:
https://www.la-traction-universelle.org/New-York-City-Bastille-Day-Vintage-Citroen-Parade_168___155.html
https://www.20minutes.fr/tv/afp-actus/125333-les-2cv-celebrent-le-bastille-day-a-new-york
The 2CV Forum of Quebec did a RAID from Montreal to NYC for the event. You can view an extensive photo gallery of their trip here:
There were other Bastille Day events in Canada and the USA:
In Toronto, Citroën Autoclub Canada members gathered at Crepes-a-GoGo (at their new location just west of Spadina on Bloor) to enjoy music, dancing and, of course, food! They were joined by a 2CV enthusiast from Poland, Jarek Janeczek, who happened to be visiting Toronto, and was thrilled to meet Citroën owners over here.
The Ottawa Citroën Club was asked to display three 2CVs at the French Embassy in Ottawa for their Bastille Day festivities.
Here’s a link to more pictures of that event: https://ottawacitroenclub.ca/news-nouvelles/bastille-day-at-the-french-embassy
And in in Minneapolis, though the skies were overcast, the weather was otherwise perfect for Saturday’s Alliance Francaise Bastile Day party. The Citroën Club of Minnesota did itself proud, with representation of models from 1935 through the CX of 1987. There were three 2CVs (Grika, Schmidt, Cornell), three DSs (Anderson, Williams, Fantin), one TAV Commerciale (Grover), one exquisitely detailed SM, and one CX Prestige (Barone, with a hot-starting issue that seemed to solve itself but put it out of the funning for rides). Grover, Grika, Anderson, Cornell, Barone and Schmidt (driving their white 2CV) and Lindberg gave numerous rides to excited and curious attendees (ranging in age from 8 to nearly 80).