Philip Brunelle, Butch Thompson Trio, Hall Brothers New Orleans Jazz Band, Charlie Maguire. Vern Sutton,
[undocumented]
Sons of Knute Statue of the Unknown Norwegian
It's been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon. It probably won't be quiet all day today. They are planning to shoot off some fireworks tonight. But it has been a quiet week. And probably they will enjoy the fireworks all the more for the fact that it was. Some places I think fireworks are just more of the same.
And especially among families and in places where people watch a lot of television all week and see a lot of people blown away. Fireworks are not that big a deal. See a loud noise and see an explosion and flares in the sky. But in Lake Wobegon, it is quite dramatic and people enjoy it.
And they will enjoy it all the more tonight because the volunteer fire department has taken charge of the fireworks after years of the sons of Canute firing them off at the ballpark. The volunteer fire department reminds you that the fireworks show begins at 9.30 tonight at the Wally Old Hard Hands Bunsen Memorial Ballpark.
Admission is 50 cents for adults, 25 cents for children, and they ask you to please come by the grandstand and pay your admission, even if you're not going to sit there in the grandstand, which you probably won't on account of the roof over it, but come and to pay up your money anyway because they've gone to great expense to put on a terrific show for you tonight with all the best of the fountains and the rockets and the Roman candles and all the rest of it.
And for those of you who have not come for the last few years because the sons of Canute had a few accidents with some rockets and got excited and confused by all the noise and set off some of them at a rather low trajectory so that they went directly into the grandstand and caromed off the underside of the roof into the cheap seats. It will not happen again. They had the big parade. The parade went off without a hitch. Today in Lake Wobegon, from the statue of the unknown Norwegian in the center of town, they had a terrific parade.
They sent it around the block. It didn't go down the street. It went around the block three times so that the people who were in the parade, which includes most of the people in town, could take turns dropping out so they have a chance to see the others.
The Sons of Canute were there in their costumes with their plumes and their little ceremonial swords and their drum and tuba corps marching along and the honor guard. They were followed by a long string of brand new cars and tractors and implements.
Everybody in Lake Welbegon who's bought a new car, pickup, truck, or manure spreader, or planter, or anything new in the last year, they fall right in behind the sons of Canute. And they have a right to be in the parade. The softball teams were in there.
Behind them, the ocarina band was there from Our Lady of Perpetual Responsibility in their little red and blue capes. And family units were marching in there. The Krebsbachs were there and the Lugers were there, and the Torvaldsons and the Bunsons, all marching under their family banners. And around and around the block they went.
The municipal band did not march in the parade this Fourth of July. They got chairs and they sat in front of the statue and they played as the band marched around, the parade marched around in front of them. They have always had a hard time playing music while marching to it at the same time.
It has always been a problem for them and things went a lot better this year with them sitting down, seated with the music in front of them and able to concentrate on it. There was the Ice Cream Social that followed and the event sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce and all the races, the gunny sack race and the three-legged race and the egg toss. And this year they had a garden tractor pull, which was very exciting too. And it concluded with the race that is organized every year by Bud, the village maintenance man, the weeding race, in which two teams of young people go down the street, one team at each curb, and they remove all the weeds for about three blocks. They did a terrific job. The town looks a lot better for it, and we thank all of them for doing that. That was the Fourth of July today in Lake Wobegon.
What they'll do tonight, I'm not sure, but that's the news. From Lake Wobegon, Minnesota, where all the women are strong, and all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.
1981.07.03 La Crosse Tribune / 1981.06.28 Murfreesboro Daily News