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Community Corner

Lake Bluff Fourth of July Committee Works Year-Round For 1 Big Day

Unpaid committee members make the Fourth of July a defining community moment.

The Fourth of July parade is undoubtedly Lake Bluff’s most defining event of the year. So defining, in fact, that it takes a year to plan.

“We start the day after the parade,” said Deb Dintruff, president of the committee, which coordinates not only the parade but the , block party, ice cream social, and annual parade book.

Dintruff said not long after each year’s parade, the committee has a "Thank You BBQ" for volunteers to celebrate the payoff of hard work and begin gathering feedback to make next year’s parade even better. Starting in September, the committee meets once each month as a complete board, and frequently meets in smaller groups to focus on specific details or logistics.

Dintruff has been a volunteer in the Lake Bluff Fourth of July Parade committee for five years, and this is her third year as president. Dintruff and the 14 other committee members work with village departments year-round to plan the parade.

The committee is unpaid and comprised of Lake Bluff residents from a variety of backgrounds.

“None of us had event experience at all,” Dintruff said. “Everybody’s got their little ways of working.”

The parade is completely self-funded, a detail people in Lake Bluff are becoming more aware of, Dintruff said. Funds are raised by donations from local families and businesses, support from 12 local sponsors and selling advertisements in the parade book.

The parade includes paid entrants to ramp up the content. “This year we have a bag-pipe band, a brilliant marching band and dance teams,” Dindtruff said.

The committee’s tasks have changed with the times. Six years ago, the parade website went online, and this year the committee began sending e-mail newsletters and marketing the parade online, according to Dintruff.

The process of planning the parade changes slightly every year but remains essentially the same. They still use strategies passed on from the Lake Bluff American Legion Post 510, which planned the parade up until the transition to a civilian committee in 2004.

“They did a good job of documenting what it took to do the parade,” said Paul Lemieux, who was president of the committee from 2006-2008. “Around here, they like the Fourth of July better than Christmas. It’s a big deal. The continuity after the Legion was really important to all of us.”

Lemiuex said the difficult part of the transition was respecting what the Legion had done, but recognizing what needed to change. “They were very gracious about recognizing that the parade needed changing, and good about coaching us on what would work and what wouldn’t,” he said.

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He also noted the transition from the military style of the Legion. “They used to call the president of the committee, ‘commander,’” he said.

William Dobbins, committee treasurer since it was formed and an American Legion member of 42 years, agreed the transition went smoothly.

"They got the committee together and watched over our shoulders the first year. The next year they took on more, and more the next year until they took it over," Dobbins said.

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"Last year the Legion was honored and we rode in a flat bed truck in the parade," Dobbins added. It was the only time he was in the parade.

The Legion members still volunteer on parade day, running an information booth and parking lot. “They still work very hard,” Dintruff said.

The committee feels a great responsibility for preserving the tradition and history of the parade, Dintruff said. “I’ve been here 15 years. You don’t leave town on the Fourth. I left one year and I felt like I really missed out.”

“We get direct feedback from viewers. My favorite complaint is that the parade is too long,” Lemieux said.

However, he said, complaints are rare; the committee receives tremendous support from the community.

Residents vote with their dollars to keep the parade local and prevent it from becoming something other than a local event, Lemieux said.

“We really work to keep the parade from getting too commercial. We want community entrants in the parade, but we also want to keep it interesting,” he said.

For that reason, entrants aren’t allowed to simply drive a car as part of the parade.

Lemeiux said the parade helps the community thrive. “People buy houses because they’re on the parade route,” he said. “I did.”

Dintruff and Lemieux agreed the best part of the parade is when it’s over, and the committee can see their hard work pay off.

“When it’s all over and people say it was a great parade, it’s bittersweet but it’s wonderful,” said Lemieux.

Dintruff said the parade is personal for her because of her deep sense of patriotism.

“I get kind of emotional when the anthem plays,” she said. “I do appreciate the root of it all.”

 

Parade photo courtesy of Cyn Mycoskie, www.cynimage.com

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