Fourth of July parade floats are often one of the most exciting parts of attending any event. At parades in Leelanau County this year, while there are sure to be new floats and cars decorated creatively, people can expect many participants and their entries in the lineup to look familiar.
Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore (SBDNL), a returning participant in the Stan Brubaker Fourth of July Parade in Glen Arbor, brings out both an actual park themed float as well as their noticeable Bear Force One van, which is a mobile visitor center. The park neighbors the town, and being a participant in the parade is something SBDNL staff look forward to every year.
“No matter what age you are, parades are always fun to participate in. For us, I think this is an extra special one just because Glen Arbor is our closest gateway community that’s practically in the park. So it’s great to kind of start in the park and go down main street there,” said Emily Sunblade, Supervisory Interpretation Park Ranger. “We can’t send everybody because we need to make sure that we have people here to greet the visitors in the park. So it does kind of become a very coveted thing of who gets chosen to be walking in the parade.”
The Bear Force One van, which has been driven by park ranger Duane for the last few years, normally follows the lineup in front of the actual float. The van was fabricated in 2020, the park’s 50th anniversary, and serves as a mobile contact station at outreach events throughout Michigan.
“It’s really eye-catching and it attracts people’s interests, which is our goal to contact as many people as we can and make sure they have the information they need to have a safe visit,” Sunblade added. “We have three staff that are going to be there and some of our interns and then volunteers from our partner organizations like both the Friends of Sleeping Bear Dunes and Preserve Historic Sleeping Bear are invited to come and join us.”
The float that follows behind the van was created in 2013 and features the South Manitou Island Lighthouse, the Dune Climb, Lake Michigan (Number 9) Overlook, a Piping Plover nesting area sign, and even Mishe-Mokwa, the mother bear. For more than a decade, the float has made an appearance in the Glen Arbor Fourth of July parade, as well as the Empire Anchor Day, Cedar Polka Fest, and Traverse City National Cherry Festival parades. Other than changing out the flags on the float, it has essentially stayed the same through the years.
“We kind of get it out to our gateway communities… but the main focus (of the float) is the dune and it’s quite tall. From the ground up, it’s probably seven or eight feet off the ground,” she said. “We have great volunteers, we would not be able to do what we do without all of their help.”
After the parade, people are encouraged to check out the Lyle Gun Demonstration at the Maritime Museum Beach from 2-3 p.m. The National Park Service will be holding the demonstrations where a cannon will be fired every Thursday until August 29 at the same time and location.
Leelanau Community Church (LCC) has made an appearance in the Leland Fourth of July parade for the last several years. Church members and their families are seen usually walking alongside a signature blue 1959 Ford F100 truck owned by Omena resident Sally Viskochill. While the truck is lightly decorated with American flags, it also showcases a banner for the program “Operation Christmas Child.” The program aims to collect shoe box donations filled with things like toys, school supplies, and hygiene items for children around the world.
Jeff Lingaur is a member of Leelanau Community Church and has driven the truck in the parade for the last four or five years. LCC pastor Lucy Schaub sometimes rides beside him in the passenger seat, and a whole team of church volunteers gathers around the truck as it makes its way through the crowd.
“It’s something that we get to do together as a church, so that’s fun, and letting people know about what we’re doing with Operation Christmas Child,” Lingaur said. “It’s kind of a weird thing to do maybe in the middle of summer, but we kind of keep it front of us year round because we put together just as a church 200-300 boxes. I think last year we collected over 1,000 boxes from the people in the area, our church, and the ones that we put together amounted to over 100 boxes. This is just another way to let people know about it.”
The truck’s decorations are modest and simple as the main message is to spread awareness about the donation program, but this year, Lingaur said they’re thinking about setting up a Christmas tree to emphasize Operation Christmas Child. Church members get to Leland to prepare about an hour before the parade starts at 2 p.m., where they will pass out candy, flyers, and pinwheels for people in the crowd.
“There are people from out of town going to the parade and they get one of these flyers, they can find somewhere locally where they live to drop a shoe box off. Boxes are collected from the first part to the middle of November, so we’re getting people to think about it,” he said. “It’s well organized. Other churches will bring their boxes to our church and then we collect and box them and drop them off in Traverse City.”
