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Independence Day Celebration 2011

A Thank You from the Town of Minturn,

The Minturn Independence Day Parade was surely blessed with great weather this year for which we were all extremely grateful. I'm also very grateful to the people whose hard work made the parade and festivities at Little Beach Park possible.

The event would not have been the success it was without the generous donations from our sponsors. Many thanks go to the following Minturn Independence Day Sponsors, Participants and Volunteers:

  • Jayded Clothing Store owner, Karen Funnelle-Harkens, has taken over the biggest part of the Independence Day event for me and done a fantastic job keeping things scheduled, planned, and organized. Karen worked on this event beginning in January of 2011 and kept the planning on schedule every step of the way. Jayded Clothing Store also sponsored the water gun station at Little Beach Park and provided wine for the beer tent.
  • The Minturn Police Dept. was essential in insuring the safety of all participants in the parade and following festivities. An extra thank you to Police Chief, Lorenzo Martinez for organizing the attendance of a Blackhawk helicopter with the HAATS program. What an amazing addition the Blackhawk was to our festivities!
  • Minturn Community Fund for not only the parade entry announcements and flags for the kids, but also the balloon clown and face painters at the Little Beach Park festivities.
  • Johnie's Garden for the sponsorship of the kid's sack races, the kids definitely had a great time.
  • Crazy Mountain Brewery for the donation of beer which helped bring in money for future Minturn special events. Thank you to all those who volunteered their time to work the beer tent, including, Cliff Thompson with Battle Mountain Development for making sure everyone was over 21 and had a wrist band. Many thanks to Minturn Town Attorney Allen Christensen and Barb Hoch for serving over 300 cups of beer and to Jay Brunvand, Minturn Town Treasurer for supervising the tent.
  • The Vail Fire Department who kindly donated the use of their dunk tank. All the money raised by the dunk tank will go toward the Minturn Scholarship Fund. For those persons kind enough to be dunked in order to help raise the money…thank you for being such good sports! Dunk tank volunteers included: Council Members Earle Bidez, Shelley Bellm and John Rosenfeld, Town Manager Jim White and local resident Frank Lorenti. Thank you for your willingness to participate!
  • Eagle River Fire Protection District for their assistance in getting the dunk tank and the water gun pools filled with water.
  • Wal-Mart for their generous donation of watermelons. Who would have thought the watermelon eating contest would have been so competitive?
  • Extra thanks to Vicki Trujillo for overseeing the watermelon tent (and also for helping with event set-up). Vicki's organizational skills and ability to put together the schematic of this competition at the last minute were second to none!
  • Andy Kaufman, owner Minturn Saloon and Bruce Plummer, bartender extraordinaire for donating and delivering a massive amount of ice for the beer tent.
  • Elijah and Ezekiel Martinez for all the assistance in the set-up and clean-up of Little Beach Park.
  • Vail Daily and 101.7 Ski Country radio for helping us get the word out about this great event.
  • Vail Honeywagon for donating the trash receptacles.
  • Minturn Public Works for setting up and dismantling of equipment.

I have a special thank you for the parade participants who recognized the importance of the day and did such a great job expressing, through their parade entries, what Independence Day means to them. For everyone who worked so hard decorating their entries, and putting on a great show, you did a wonderful job.

Parade entries included:

  • VFW Post 10721 Honor Guard (it wouldn't be an Independence Day parade without you).
  • Eagle River Fire Protection Dist. with Chief Charlie Moore and the historic Gilman fire truck.
  • Vail Valley's classic Lawnchair Brigade
  • Minturn Community Fund
  • Town of Minturn, with Minturn Town Council member Jerry Bumgarner and Town Manager Jim White.
  • Minturn Muscle Cars
  • US Forest Service and White River National Forest
  • Local resident Jen Counselman and all the patriotic kids
  • Frank Lorenti with FAS, LLC (what a great float!)
  • The Turntable Restaurant, Darla, Debbie and all the kids
  • SteamMaster Restoration and Cleaning
  • The Gallegos Corporation
  • Minturn Anglers
  • Boy Scout Troop 231 (great to have the Troops involved!)
  • Stick Fingers Café & HoltHammer Cycles
  • Jerry Sibley Plumbing, what a great train!
  • Roy & Lorraine Vasquez
  • Ski & Snowboard Club Vail
  • Alpine Wind Ensemble (it was so nice to have the music!)

 

Thanks to Minturn Court Clerk, Lisa Osborne, who organized the parade entries in the Municipal parking lot and also supervised the children's bouncy castle during the party at Little Beach Park.

From everyone here at the Town of Minturn, thank you for all your work to create such a memorable day!

Michelle Metteer
Town of Minturn


2011 Photos