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Junior grand marshal. Heidi Gonzalez, a junior at Tomales High, was named junior grand marshal of Sunday’s Western Weekend parade. She earned the title in competition with two other young women by selling the most raffle tickets; half the proceeds were allocated to nonprofits and the other half to furthering their education.
The bagpipers in Sunday’s parade carried placards that read: “What’s on Our Streets Flows into Our Creeks” and “Please Pick It Up, Every Little Bit Helps.”
Dancing down the parade route was a group from Esforço Carnival, San Francisco.
Also dancing in the street were Aztec dancers, a highlight of every parade.
At the head of the parade was a procession of fire engines, as is also traditional.
The parade entry of KWMR FM won first place in the adult-float category of the parade. Four baby goats owned by truck owner John Roche Services, which uses goats to trim grass, were in the cage at right. In the center clapping is my wife, Lynn, a member of the community-owned radio station’s board of directors.
Coco McMorrow, 14, of Inverness was one of two deputy junior grand marshals of the parade.
Deputy junior grand marshal Hana Cassel.
The weekend was so packed with public events that I’ll spend a moment now showing snapshots of the main ones.
Point Reyes-Olema 4-H Club members get training Saturday for the rabbit-show competition in Toby’s Feed Barn where most of the festivities were centered. Back in the 1970s and 80s when there was more ranching in West Marin, horses and livestock were a major part of the “4-H Junior Livestock Show,” as the celebration was then called. No more.
Inside the Feed Barn’s gallery was a display of children’s arts and crafts. The caption on this display explains, “DeeLynn Armstrong’s 1st grade class at Inverness School, alongside Esther Underwood’s 5th grade class at West Marin School, created a rainbow mosaic using recycled plastic bottle caps.”
“Melissa Reilly’s kindergarten class at Inverness School studied animal habitat and made snakes from felted wool. The process starts with raw, unspun wool which is wetted with soapy water,” explained the caption. “The snakes are shaped by hand and once dry, the wood fibers contract and become felted. This project was facilitated by Jillian Moffett.”
A Saturday evening barn dance was held in, appropriately enough, Toby’s Feed Barn. With a band and a caller setting the pace, children and adults took part in a variety of line dances.
Angelo Sacheli (center) describes the low-cost-housing accomplishments by Mark Switzer (left) in naming him grand marshal of Sunday’s parade. Avito Miranda prepares to translate the remarks into Spanish.
Competitors in the junior grand marshal ticket-selling competition were (from left): Coco McMorrow, Heidi Gonzalez, and Hana Cassel. Miss Gonzalez ended up junior grand marshal while Ms. McMorrow and Ms. Cassel were named deputy junior grand marshals. Last year’s junior grand marshal, Mollie Donaldson (in back), hung the sashes on the three.
Ms. Gonzalez’s junior grand marshal recognition came with both flowers and a trophy.
After the awards ceremony, the dancing resumed.
Waiting for Sunday’s parade proved tiring for at least one youngster.
Mainstreet Moms, political activists who meet weekly at St. Columba’s Church in Inverness, carried placards urging people to vote.
Straus Dairy’s entry is always a hit because it gives out free cartons of ice cream. Dairyman Albert Straus is at left.
Petaluma dairy princess Amanda King and first alternate Camilla Taylor.
Bill Barrett leads the parade entry of the Coastal Marin Fund, which benefits local nonprofit organizations by selling artistic brass coins to use for local purchases and for tourists to take home.
West Marin Community Services, which runs the food bank and the thrift store in Point Reyes Station while also providing many other forms of assistance to low-income people.
Vern Abrams, who has been living in his car in Point Reyes Station, used a musical parade entry to remind parade goers of the needs of West Marin’s homeless residents.
The Inverness Garden Club, which maintains several public flowerbeds in Inverness and Point Reyes Station, handed out flowers as it proceeded down the street.
The 63rd annual Western Weekend, which celebrates West Marin’s agricultural heritage, drew one of its largest crowds in a decade last weekend. On Saturday, the West Marin 4-H Fair, the Western Weekend queen’s coronation, and a barn dance were all held at Toby’s Feed Barn.
Sunday’s events began with a noontime parade down the three-block-long main street of Point Reyes Station. Despite the short route, the parade lasted more than an hour because street performances frequently stopped the procession. In addition, a few entries upon reaching the end of the route took a side street back to the starting point and made a second pass through town, thereby lengthening the parade.
Following the parade, the Marin County Farm Bureau held a chicken barbecue in Toby’s parking lot while a band played, people danced, and 4-H members sold pastries.
4-H Fair Olivia Blantz of Point Reyes-Olema 4-H (left) and Emily Charlton of San Rafael 4-H cradle their poultry prior to the judging in Toby’s Feed Barn. Olivia’s hen won Best in Show.
Emily’s sister Erin Rose Charlton won the Showmanship award in the Junior category for her hen.
Goats Olivia Tyrnauer’s goat Cinnamon (right) won first place in Senior Showmanship. Olivia is a member of Mill Valley 4-H.
A Pigmy goat named Sylvester, which is owned by Megan Sintef of Nicasio 4-H, won a first place award in Junior Showmanship.
Altogether five goats were entered for judging in the 4-H Fair.
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Rabbits Amelia Paulsey, 6, from San Rafael 4-H with her bunny Butterfly is questioned by her mother Kari Paulsey, who happened to be one of the judges.
For the first time in memory, no large animals such as cows and horses were entered in the 4-H Fair. As Allison Keaney, Marin County 4-H program representative, explained: “The fair in general has been running the risk of just not happening. With the alterations of the school schedules over the years, the first weekend in June [became] hard for folks.
“Our fair only had 36 members enter, representing only 25 families. That is actually up from last year. We only had two large-animal entries in 2010 and 2011 and therefore scratched the competition.
“Also, the demographic of our county enrollment has changed. The average age of our members has dropped a lot. We have lots of little members, which is exciting for the future, but members can’t do a large-animal project until they are nine years old.”
Western Weekend Queen Brenda Rico of Point Reyes Station riding in Sunday’s parade.
Parade Grand Marshal Michael Mery of Point Reyes Station.
Marin County Sheriff Bob Doyle (right) rides on a buckboard in Sunday’s parade.
Last hurrah Lynn Woolsey (D-Petaluma) takes a last ride in a Western Weekend parade as a congresswoman before she retires from the US House of Representatives.
Incumbent Marin County Supervisor Steve Kinsey of Forest Knolls (center) does some last-minute campaigning during the Western Weekend parade in advance of this week’s election.
Congressional candidate Norman Solomon (D-Inverness Park) and his wife Cheryl Higgins led a large contingent of supporters in the Western Weekend parade.
The Aztec Dancers of Santa Rosa, traditional Western Weekend parade favorites, stopped periodically during the procession to dance to the beat of a drum. The dancers took third place in Adult Street Shows. They also won the parade’s Grand Prize.
KWMR community radio, 90.5 FM in Point Reyes Station and 89.9 FM in Bolinas, was represented by numerous marchers and an elaborate float. The entry won 2nd place among Adult Drill Teams.
Youngsters took advantage of the main street’s curb in order to have front-row seating for the parade, as well as to grab candies thrown from floats.
Adult spectators took whatever seating they could find, which for Gary Martin (left) and Bill Barrett was a spot on the front of the judges’ stand.
The Nave Patrola annually spoofs the World War I Italian Army, with the patrol’s soldiers marching chaotically and sometimes pausing to anachronistically shout, “Il Duce!, the group won the Best Adult Drill Team award, as well as the overall Best Drill Team award.
In the early 1970s, an official from the Italian Consulate in San Francisco complained to parade organizers, the West Marin Lions Club, that the patrol disparaged Italians, what with its seemingly confused marchers colliding with each other and going off in all directions. Defenders of the patrol replied that many of the members are of Italian descent.
The seventh and eighth grade rock band from West Marin School were highlights of the parade. Here the eighth grade performs some rock’n roll classics. The West Marin Kids Who Rock band won first place in Kids’ Music plus the overall Best Music award.
Papermill Creek Children’s Corner preschool in Point Reyes Station took 1st place among Kids’ Drill Teams.
The Wedding Party with Carol Rossi and pugs won first in Adult Animals. Possibly influencing the judges’ decision was their being given the top layer of the wedding cake.
Blazing Saddle Jason McLean of Point Reyes Station (left) sits astride one of two metal deer he built, with his deer shooting fire out its rear end. McLean’s entry took 1st place among Adult Vehicles.
West Marin Community Services, which sponsors among other things the Food Pantry, the Thrift Store in Point Reyes Station, and the Tomales Bay Waterdogs swimming classes for youths, took 1st place among Kids’ Floats.
A 1920s buggy driven by Ethan McNamara took 1st among Kids’ Horses and won the Best Horse award.
West Marin Pharmacy joined the parade for the first time this year and won 1st place in Adult Music.
Halleck Creek Ranch in Nicasio, which operates a riding club for disabled children, took 1st in Kids’ Animals and the Best Animal award.
West Marin’s own tap dancers, the Fab-U-Taps, provided a street performance called Women of the World for Peace. The group took 1st place among Adult Street Shows, as well as the overall Best Street Show award.
Following Sunday’s parade, the West Marin Lions Club held a chicken barbecue in the parking lot of Toby’s Feed Barn. Members of Point Reyes-Olema 4-H sold pastries, and the Doc Kraft Dance Band inspired people to get up and dance.
