Crowd turns out for parade
Parade goes on for almost an hour
By Bobbi Mlynar
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Parker Leeds couldn’t quite decide what he liked best about the Fourth of July parade Wednesday morning.
The 2 1/2-year-old stood on a flower-bed curb and watched the entries go by, never bored and never fussing to get out of the heat. He was simply fascinated.
“I like the tractors — and the BIG tractors,” Parker said as Raymond VanSickle led the Flint Hills Antique Power Association’s procession of old tractors past.
“Is this as close as we could get to a covered wagon?” asked retired Judge Bob Morton, laughing.
Even Gary Watts’ old tractor, which resembled an overgrown hang glider, passed into oblivion for Parker when a 4x4 truck painted with stars and stripes and a Statue of Liberty turned the corner.
“Look, a truck!” Parker shouted.
More thrills were to come, including the towering trucks of Detachment 1, 129th Transportation Co. out of Osage City.
A six-car train pulled by a small tractor disguised as Engine No. 8 wheeled by with carloads of children; it stopped in front of the Lyon County Courthouse to pick up a passenger on the far side of the street.
Near the end of the parade, Parker became excited when he looked up to see “my favorite truck — fire trucks.”
In between were entries to suit any parade-goer’s tastes, including a Speedster airplane pulled down the street by the Emporia Airport Action Group Association.
A five-member color guard of veterans, followed by a Veterans of Foreign Wars van, led the parade behind its police escort. The Wichita Caledonian Pipes and Drums made up the only band entered in the parade, with the possible exception of the Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War’s fife and drum that accompanied the uniformed soldiers as they marched.
Retired city manager Virgil Basgall was honored with his own entry, marking his 21 years of leading the city and its government.
Several of Emporia’s founding families were represented in cars — the Sodens, Hammonds, Plumbs and Haworths — and the Fowler family, with far greater numbers, rode past on a three-hay-wagon train pulled by a tractor.
A small tractor disguised as a covered wagon and “pulled” by an old plastic rocking horse was driven by a bearded, costumed driver with a sign posted: “Emporia or Bust.”
“Well, there’s my covered wagon,” Morton said.
First Christian Church won the Parade Marshal’s Award with its float featuring a black-suited preacher standing behind a pulpit with its congregation, dressed in 1850’s garb, seated before him.
The Mayor’s Award went to the Christy Family, whose entry featured a miniature race car painted with Budweiser logos and carrying American flags.
The First Congregational Church went to considerable effort to outfit its “Galilee by the Sea” marchers in period clothing of 2,000 years ago.
Only a handful of horses marched down Commercial, but an assortment of Arab Shrine Mini-T’s and miniature “choppers” motorcycles joined in the parade.
Ann Havenhill and a group of women dressed in 1919 garb marched alongside the League of Women Voters’ float as they campaigned to give women the right to vote. Havenhill’s husband, Jack, was among a group seated at registration tables on the float, presumably to register newly empowered women in 1920.
If there had been an award for ingenuity, Delwin and Sharon Burton would have been candidates for the prize. The Burtons rode motorized La-Z-Boy recliners down the street, with no obvious means of horsepower showing. Sharon Burton’s lounger had a magazine rack attached on one side, with a lamp and ’50s-ish turquoise telephone on a small table and rack attached to the other.