Papal appearance at Independence Hall tix gone in minutes

Ten thousand free tickets for the public to attend the appearance of Pope Francis on Saturday, Sept. 26, at Independence Hall were gobbled up within minutes of becoming available online at noon Tuesday.

And in a nanosecond, some of them were being offered for sale online.

The Archdiocese of Philadelphia said reservations for the Independence Hall tickets were placed within two minutes, during which time the ticket website clocked 394,000 unique pages views.

Another 10,000 tickets each for the Festival of Families event that same night and for the papal Mass the next day will become available Wednesday. Both of those events will take place on the Benjamin Franklin Parkway.

Organizers of the papal visit made additional tickets available last week after an outcry that an initial set of passes for the Independence Hall gathering would be limited to 5,000 and that passes for the two Parkway events would be issued only to Catholic parishes in the area and attendees of the World Meeting of Families gathering taking place in advance of the pope's arrival in Philadelphia.

No sooner had the electronic ticket window closed than tickets were being officed for sale online for $100 or more each. However, on Craigslist, one lucky person named Devin was offering to give away two of the four tickets he obtained to whoever e-mailed him with the best response to "why I should send you 2 free tickets" by 8 p.m.

WMOF officials in the meantime announced the performers for the pope's appearance at Independence Hall, where he is expected to make an address on immigration and religious liberty.

The Philly POPS Festival Brass will perform Aaron Copland's "Fanfare for the Common Man" when Pope Francis arrives on stage to make his address.

Eight groups, reflecting the city's "immigrant heritage and cultural diversity," will perform at Independence Mall before the pope's arrival.

They are:

- El Mariachi Flores, a regionally based mariachi band with roots in Mexico City;

- Kùlú Mèlé African Dance and Drum Ensemble;

- Mystic Warriors, an Andean music group;

- Pablo Batista and the Mambo Syndicate, a salsa performing group;

- Philadelphia Argentine Tango School, representing the music and dance of the pope's native Argentina;

- Polish American Cultural Center, which will have a group of 20 students, ages 10 to 16, who attend St. Adalbert Polish Language School, performing traditional Polish dances;

- Tibetan Association of Philadelphia, which will perform traditional Tibetan dances a month in advance of the Dalai Lama's own visit to the city;

- and the Vietnamese Fan Dancers of Rowan University.

Editor's Note: An earlier version of this story incorrectly reported the number of tickets made available Tuesday. It was 10,000, not 5,000.