HAVE FUN, MAKE FUN
Towns unite for July Fourth parades; Doo Dah mocks so all can laugh
Fourth of July. Independence Day. The most American day of the year, celebrated with waving flags, firework displays and, of course, parades. But what’s in a parade? In central Ohio, there are parades such as the one in Dublin, where the traditional is tradition. And there’s the Doo Dah Parade, where it’s traditional to break all the rules.
Yesterday’s morning air, fall-like in July, carried the excited chatter of small children along the
route of Dublin’s Independence Day parade. Generations of families set up their folding chairs along Rt. 161 in anticipation of the parade’s start.
As a group of military veterans marched with flags held high, the crowd stood and applauded. Kids ran to the orange barricades, staring wide-eyed at the firetrucks and holding out plastic bags for thrown candy.
Over the next hour and a half, the streets of Dublin saw Irish dancers, rodeo drill teams, three high-school marching bands and more. City officials and their families waved to the crowd from Ford Mustangs and Buick Skylarks, smiling and greeting their neighbors and friends.
It was a community atmosphere: Friends looked for people they know, calling out their names and snapping pictures. Moms and dads waved to children marching with a dance school or Cub Scout pack. Teenagers leaned against buildings, pretending not to care but watching all the same.
“It’s just a lot of fun,” said Mara Beihl VanVliet, who lives in Dublin and has marched in the parade with her husband and two daughters for about 10 years.
“We see friends from church, we see friends from the neighborhood, and it’s a great way to volunteer.”
As the Dublin parade came to a close, a parade of a very different kind was lining up in Victorian Village.
A woman wearing a Hillary Clinton mask knocked down an opponent in an elephant mask and placed her foot atop her fallen foe. A man in a hospital gown drove a cart with “VA” written on the front and “Hurry up and wait” on the side.
Farther down the line, a group of men in Mexican wrestling masks gave cardboard masks similar to their own to the kids along the route. They invited a boy to hit a pinata on the end of a stick. He smashed the thing to the ground, and, with a little help from one of the bigger luchadores, scattered candy onto the street. Other kids scampered to grab it.
The annual Doo Dah Parade is an amalgam of costumes and political commentary that celebrates a different kind of independence than is traditionally associated with the Fourth of July: independence to do whatever you want.
“I think the best word is irreverent,” said Steve Hofmann of Clintonville, who has been to the parade about seven times.
As the parade made its way down Neil Avenue toward 2nd Avenue, a group marched in the opposite direction — upstream — hoisting pictures of fish on two-by-fours and a sign reading “Salmon Against Doo Dah.”
The parade satirized the extreme weather of the past winter, with a theme of Doo Dah Vortex. Meteorologist Jym Ganahl of WCMH-TV (Channel 4) served as less-than-grand marshal.
“You don’t know what to expect,” said Leeann Mattes of Clintonville, who has been coming to the parade off and on for about 15 years.
“It’s spontaneous. It’s noholds-barred. You never know what you’re going to get.”
Whether celebrating Independence Day the more traditional way or with an alternative spin, one thing’s for certain: As Mattes said, “There’s always something good to see.”