Khary Stokes was exhausted before it even started.
Stokes, 12 and of Chicago Heights, Illinois, flopped down on a curb with his gym bag Sunday morning, head on his knees while he looked at his phone. Part of the Chicagoland favorite Jesse White Tumblers, his team was running late for Crown Point’s annual July 4 parade.
As the entries started exiting from the Crown Point High School parking lot, Khary’s godmother, Angela Salley, started getting nervous.
“I just talked to someone from another team, but they were headed to a different parade,” Salley, of Chicago Heights, said. “We took the local roads, but they must be stuck in traffic.”
As their unit slowly started to head toward the exit, Khary’s tumbling team pulled up, and like the pros they are the quickly put together the team’s float.
“This is a huge parade,” Salley said. “And it’s really exciting, because last year was something else — quite a challenge for everyone. It’s a great moment today.”
Setting up the parade was easy enough even after a year off, longtime volunteer Cindy Beckman said. With late registrations, Sunday’s parade was up to 98 entries; the typical range for Crown Point is 100 to 150.
“This is definitely a nice turnout, especially after last year,” Beckman said.
When entries come in, they’re grouped together first alphabetically and then split up into units across the high school parking lot. This year, the city demarcated spaces in the parking lot for further ease, she said.
Once it’s time to start the parade, the volunteers for each row direct their entries to the starting line, Beckman said.
“Other than the city taking over, there’s really nothing different, and everything’s running smoothly,” she said.
Representatives from the South Lake County Agricultural Historical Society were raring and ready to go with their sea of red antique tractors — plus one green one, the John Deere Society President Bill Wiater let his 10-year-old grandson, Cameron Wiater, commandeer for the parade.
“I always drive it,” Cameron said proudly atop the tractor. “I take it out in our subdivision just to practice.”
Even though the “red guys” — Jerry McGarr, of Crown Point; Gary Wicik, of Crete, Illinois; and Chad Read, of Lowell — give the “green guys” a little gentle ribbing, there really isn’t much difference in the Deere and Farmall tractors except preference, according to McGarr. The Farmalls, of which McGarr was driving a 1946 Farmall M — were the tractor of choice in the old days until its maker, International Harvester, fell on hard times, he said.
John Deere almost wiped them out, McGarr said, but then International Harvester was bought out and made a comeback. Nevertheless, who brought what tractor to the parade didn’t matter as much as being able to be there in the first place since last year was such a disappointment.
“We just like getting together and riding our tractors,” Wicik said.
Michelle L. Quinn is a freelance reporter for the Post-Tribune.
