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BISBEE — Members of this community celebrated their patriotism and diversity Wednesday with a spirited Independence Day parade featuring flag-draped floats, water-spraying fire trucks, folkloric dancing and an all-kazoo marching band.
The theme of this year’s parade was “Rockin’ Fourth of July: From mines to music, Bisbee rocks!” and the Bisbee Kiwanis Club got into the spirit with a float covered with rocking chairs and a rocking horse.
The club, which sponsors youth groups like the Boy Scouts and the high school Key Club, titled its entry “Kiwanis rocks Bisbee kids for over 80 years.”
“We do more for kids than any other organization in town,” Kiwanis member Dave Cartun said proudly.
 The Bisbee Fourth of July Parade is still going strong in the historic mining town. (Ed Honda-Herald/Review) |
Kids played a big role in the parade, and many participated with their sports teams, such as the Little League softball squad The Bandits and tee-ballers The Blue Claws, whose float proclaimed them “future Copper Kings” in reference to the local semi-pro baseball club.
Maria Hernandez, Ivette Flores, Alexa Rascon and Itzel Mares, members of the youth group at St. Michael’s Church in Naco, donned red, pink, green and yellow folkloric dresses and performed a dance called the “Jarabe Tapatio.”
“Our theme is Mexican-American culture,” the girls said.
Girl Scout Brownie Troop 450 also marched in the parade, and it was the first time that 7-year-old Brownie Marissa Meraz had participated.
“I’m excited,” she said as she waited with her troop mates for the parade to start. “I get to throw candy.”
Troop member Raianna McMahon was excited as well — Wednesday was not only Independence Day, it was also her ninth birthday.
Bisbee Boy Scout Troop 401 — soon to be officially renamed Troop 1 after it was determined to be the first troop founded in Arizona — won the “most patriotic” award in the 2006 parade after members raised an American flag and sounded a bugle call when their camping-themed float reached the judging stand.
This year, the scouts were just as creative. They built a six-foot-high wooden crate, painted it as the American flag and mounted it on the back of a flatbed trailer. When the scouts pulled up to the judges, they opened the top of the crate and launched a fleet of red, white and blue balloons into the sky.
“We wanted this year’s float to be even more patriotic,” explained troop member Dwight Donahue. “After all, it’s the Fourth of July.”
Grownups get goofy
Adults got into the act as well, including Larry Borger, who formed a 10-person, all-kazoo marching band for the event.
The idea “just came to my brain one day,” said Borger, who put an ad in the newspaper and found several other eager kazoo enthusiasts
The Rootin’ Tootin’ Kazootin’ Marching Band practiced twice before the parade, Borger said, and put together a repertoire of six tunes, including such classics as “Stars and Stripes Forever” and “When the Saints Go Marching In.”
“A few prisons have bands like this,” he noted.
Fortunately, ’60s rocker Janis Joplin (really KBRP radio station director Jill Thomas), didn’t end up behind bars for carrying an open bottle of Southern Comfort (not really whisky) along the parade route that snaked 1 1/2 miles through Bisbee’s Warren district.
Other radio station members dressed as Joan Baez, Bob Dylan, Jim Morrison and Joey Ramone and piled onto the KBRP truck float, which was driven by Kiss’ fire-breathing, blood-spitting bassist Gene Simmons — or possibly station member John Titan in disguise.
There was no disguising the loyalty of the Hillary Clinton Army, whose camouflage-clad members carried signs reading “Democratic Paaarty!” and chanted “H-C-A all the way!” to the accompaniment of a snare drum.
Afterward, 9-year-old Mayra Flores said that her favorite part of the parade had been the candy tossed from the floats, as well as a fire engine from the Naco Fire Department that sprayed water onto the overheated crowd.
She also enjoyed the horses ridden by Cochise County Sheriff Larry Dever and a charra club from Tucson called the Florecitas del Desierto.
“There’s a real sense of community when folks come out like this to see the various organizations and people on parade — and it’s a lot of fun,” said Mayor Ron Oertle.
“Bisbee is the grandest small town in America, and the Fourth of July illustrates that.”
herald/review reporter Jonathan Clark can be reached at 515-4693 or at jonathan.clark@bisbeereview.net.
Sandra Calhoun wrote on Jul 5, 2007 7:51 PM: