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newlenoxpatriot.com NEWS<br />

the New Lenox Patriot | July 7, 2016 | 3<br />

Hundreds celebrate Fourth in New Lenox<br />

Tim Hadac, Freelance Reporter<br />

As the rock cover band<br />

Wildfire conducted a sound<br />

check and joked with the<br />

crowd growing on the lawn<br />

Monday, July 4, at the New<br />

Lenox Village Commons,<br />

the five-member Cruz family<br />

engaged in a friendly<br />

debate about the fireworks<br />

show coming in about 90<br />

minutes.<br />

“I like the colors; they’re<br />

beautiful, unlike anything<br />

else,” Marisol said.<br />

Her 10-year- old daughter,<br />

Giselle, agreed.<br />

“They’re like big flowers,<br />

blooming in the sky,” she<br />

said.<br />

Giselle’s father, Jose, said<br />

that while he likes the colors,<br />

the bone-shaking explosions<br />

“are what float my<br />

boat and have ever since I<br />

was a kid. Reminds me of<br />

Sox Park, from years ago,<br />

every time Frank Thomas<br />

would hit a home run.<br />

“We’d go crazy. Same<br />

here. We come here every<br />

year and cheer.”<br />

Marisol and Jose’s 3-yearold<br />

son, Angel, agreed but<br />

was more succinct.<br />

“I like the boom-booms,”<br />

he said with wide eyes.<br />

The tie-breaking vote belonged<br />

to 9-month-old Teresita,<br />

but she did not indicate<br />

a preference as she sucked<br />

her Minnie Mouse pacifier.<br />

Others were first-timers,<br />

such as New Lenox resident<br />

Colleen Lafleur and her son,<br />

Wyatt, 4, who shyly said he<br />

likes fireworks but wasn’t<br />

sure which ones were his<br />

favorites.<br />

“We did our backyard<br />

celebrating yesterday, so<br />

we figured we’d come over<br />

here for one last hurrah before<br />

we head back to work<br />

on Tuesday,” Colleen said.<br />

Some were veterans of<br />

the annual blowout, including<br />

New Lenox resident<br />

Gwen Jablonski, who<br />

wore a blue top accented<br />

by a stars-and-stripes scarf.<br />

She began attending New<br />

Lenox’s Fourth of July celebrations<br />

more than 40 years<br />

ago, she said.<br />

She sat with Sharon<br />

Schondorf, also of New<br />

Lenox, who has attended for<br />

about 30 years.<br />

“I sang here with the<br />

Lincoln-Way Area Chorale<br />

years ago, when this [event]<br />

opened up,” Jablonski said.<br />

In all, hundreds of men,<br />

women and children enjoyed<br />

New Lenox’s annual<br />

celebration of America’s<br />

independence from colonial<br />

rule.<br />

As Wildfire riled up the<br />

crowd with its high-energy<br />

version of Pat Benatar’s<br />

1980 hit “Hit Me With Your<br />

Best Shot,” several New<br />

Lenox Lions Club members<br />

roamed the crowd, prowling<br />

for generous souls to buy<br />

raffle tickets.<br />

“This event tonight is<br />

about patriotism, about the<br />

nation, about the community<br />

— and the community is<br />

what we’re all about,” said<br />

Lion Marie Wheeler, as she<br />

sold tickets at $10 each for<br />

the service organization’s<br />

60th annual sweepstakes<br />

drawing.<br />

The grand prize is $5,000,<br />

and a total of eight winners<br />

are to be drawn on July 28<br />

at the New Lenox Community<br />

Park District’s Proud<br />

American Days celebration.<br />

“And yes, this is about<br />

New Lenox, but this celebration<br />

draws people from<br />

far and wide,” Wheeler<br />

added. “Down yonder, I<br />

just met a woman here from<br />

Knoxville, Tennessee, who<br />

is visiting. So this is the<br />

face of New Lenox, but it’s<br />

also the face of America, in<br />

a way.”<br />

The club has about three<br />

dozen members and is always<br />

looking for more men<br />

and women to step forward,<br />

Wheeler said.<br />

After Wildfire burned<br />

through its 15-song set, the<br />

crowd received a pleasant<br />

jolt at 8 p.m., as pilot Tom<br />

Buck buzzed the commons<br />

The Joliet American Legion Band performs the national<br />

anthem as the colors are presented Monday, July 4, at the<br />

Village of New Lenox’s Fourth of July celebration at the<br />

Village Commons. Laurie Fanelli/22nd Century Media<br />

not once but twice in a vintage<br />

World War II Avenger,<br />

a Navy torpedo bomber that<br />

debuted in 1942 at the Battle<br />

of Midway. The flyover<br />

drew a roar from the crowd.<br />

Music lovers at the celebration<br />

then settled in to<br />

hear the more traditional<br />

sounds of the 65-piece Joliet<br />

American Legion Band,<br />

led by the baton of Tom<br />

Drake, an acclaimed band<br />

leader and music educator<br />

who joined the band as a<br />

clarinetist and has served as<br />

its conductor since John F.<br />

Kennedy was president.<br />

Founded in 1946, the band<br />

has played before seven<br />

U.S. presidents and prides<br />

itself on its disciplined musical<br />

style, in the tradition<br />

of John Philip Sousa.<br />

The biggest cheers of<br />

the evening, though, were<br />

saved for the pyrotechnics<br />

that lit up the night sky — a<br />

breathtaking combination of<br />

blooms and boom-booms,<br />

as at least one family in the<br />

crowd might have said.<br />

Thinking of Selling or Buying?<br />

Call<br />

JENNIFER<br />

CHRISTOPHER<br />

CSC, GRI, SRES<br />

815.693.8016<br />

www.jenjchristopher.com<br />

288410_5.5_x_5.indd 1<br />

6/29/16 10:29 AM

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