ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Sunday, March 16, 1997 TAG: 9703170122
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: MATT CHITTUM THE ROANOKE TIMES
MEMO: ***CORRECTION***
Published correction ran on Mar. 18.
Correction
Josh Eakin's name was spelled incorrectly in a story in Sunday's
paper about Roanoke's St. Patrick's Day parade.
There were clowns, llamas, Cub Scouts, Brownies, seven marching bands and a leprechaun. No blarney.
St. Patrick's Day was actually two days off, but the "everybody's Irish" rule still applied Saturday afternoon during Roanoke's parade to celebrate the "wearin' o' the green."
Peruvian llamas from Franklin County, even when led by a woman with a Polish name, were Irish. "Of course they are," said Cheryl Chrzanowski, who, along with the llamas' owner, Cindy Pasternak, claimed to be Irish.
Scottish bagpipe bands were Irish.
Even diminutive Chinese women were Irish.
"I'm 'O'Fu' today," said Pearl Fu, Roanoke's queen of multiculturalism and a judge for the parade.
"As far as I'm concerned, she's always 'O'Fu,''' said Ray Donnelly, the parade's chairman and chief organizer.
Roanoke has had a St. Patrick's Day parade for several years, but not one of which any self-respecting Irishman like Donnelly could be proud. Four years ago, the whole affair took 45 seconds to pass by the handful of spectators who showed up.
It could have marched around a city block and never run into itself.
This year, Donnelly set out to make the parade something worth seeing. Several hundred people watched seven marching bands trek from the corner of Albemarle Avenue and Jefferson Street to the City Market. As part of the parade's emphasis on the military in tribute to Roanoke's veterans, the U.S. Army 29th Infantry band and veterans of the D-Day invasion led the parade.
They were followed by the Kazim Temple Clowns, a bunch of hat-wearing dogs, the llamas, Cub Scouts, Brownies and little Josh Ekin, a fair-skinned, carrot-topped boy in pointy shoes who looked like he'd jumped right off a box of Lucky Charms cereal.
The Norman Fishing Tackle Choir, a motley crew of quasi-musicians in plastic green derbies, marched past the review stand in front of the City Market building, then snuck around the block and got back in the parade line again, blasting "When the Saints Go Marching In" the whole way.
The Salem Avalanche baseball team mascot, "The Nut," danced by and, as usual, was mistaken for a big raisin.
A man dressed as a big bagel passed out pale green versions of the traditional Jewish treat.
St. Patrick's Day parades are a little corny, Donnelly admitted, but it's all about having fun.
"We used to decorate our house for it," said Grace Tighe, a transplanted New Yorker of Irish descent.
A few years back, when her husband, Al Granato, was having bypass surgery on St. Patrick's Day, she and her family left him in the hospital to go watch the parade.
"We weren't even thinking about him," Tighe said with a laugh. "He's Italian anyway."
Truth be told, most folk at the parade weren't Irish, and they sure didn't know much about St. Patrick.
"Didn't he lead the people out of someplace?" said David Chaplin of Rural Retreat, who is not Irish but described himself as a "third generation redhead."
Actually, the story is that he drove the snakes out of Ireland.
"That's it, the snakes out of Ireland," Chaplin said.
According to the Irish Catholic Ancient Order of Hibernians Internet homepage, that story is a load o' bull anyway. There never were any snakes in Ireland.
"Well, that made it easier," said Brian Dinkel, another non-Irishman there to watch his sister twirl her baton with the Southernettes. Her name, coincidentally, is Erin.
The snake story, by the way, comes from the Vikings, according to the Hibernians. The guys with the horned hats translated the saint's name as "Paud-rig," which meant "toad expeller."
In all, it took about a half-hour for the whole parade to go by. That's about 40 times the length of the 1994 parade.
The judges gave Josh Ekin a little green trophy for being so cute. The Southernettes and the Sons of Confederate Veterans got trophies, too.
"We tried hard to get disqualified, but I'm afraid it appears we may have won something," said Norman Fishing Tackle Choir spokesman John Pharis.
Sorry, but the marching band trophy went to the Salem High School Spartans, who played better but weren't particularly Irish, either.
LENGTH: Medium: 98 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: CINDY PINKSTON THE ROANOKE TIMES. 1. HERB McCOMSEYby CNB(left) plays the bagpipes with the Virginia Highlanders as the St.
Patrick's parade marches past the Roanoke City Market building
Saturday afternoon. 2. Brooke Wheeler, 7, with the Southernettes
baton corps, concentrates on her baton routine during the
celebration. The Southernettes won a trophy, as did the Sons of
Confederate Veterans and the Salem High School Spartans band.
color.