Rettie and the Ragamuffin Parade: A Thanksgiving Story
For Ruby and Ivy With love THN For my sisters Lilly Sheree and Gigi with all my love DCG
All the tenement children on New York’s Lower East Side couldn’t wait for the Ragamuffin Parade on Thanksgiving morning But no one was more excited than a young girl named Loretta Stanowski whom everyone called Rettie
All you had to do was dress up like a beggar in old ragged clothes and parade down Broadway For Rettie dressing up was easy She already had holes in her shoes and worn patched clothes Then fancy uptown people would line the streets and call Here come the little ragamuffins If you held out your hand and asked Have ya anythin for Thanksgiving they’d give you a penny But the best part of the Ragamuffin Parade happened on busy street corners Handfuls of pennies were tossed in the air then all the ragamuffin children would scramble for them It was called a penny scramble and sometimes it got rough
