Sylvania Recreation District kicked off its summer season with a return to its in-person Memorial Day celebration Monday morning.
Festivities began at Northview High School, whose marching band led the parade down Main Street to Veterans’ Memorial Park. Classic cars, local organizations, and veterans processed to a ceremony at the park decorated with American flags.
“Oyez, oyez, oyez,” cried Michael Lieber, Sylvania’s official town crier, on stage to mark a return to the pomp and circumstance surrounding Memorial Day festivities from before the coronavirus pandemic.
Army Capt. Wolfgang Drescher invoked Abraham Lincoln, Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, and key moments in American military history in his address to the crowd. He called for Americans to honor veterans by celebrating the simple fact we are alive, thinking back to service men and women who did not come back alive.
“My speech was not only to honor the deceased,” Mr. Drescher told The Blade. “The second part of my speech [articulated that] we the living must take on the task before us as Abe Lincoln said, to eradicate racism and bring peace back to our communities.”
The ceremony also featured patriotic tunes and a performance of “Taps” by bugler Colin Smith.
Sylvania Mayor Craig Stough said it was wonderful to have the Memorial Day parade again — as last year’s observance was abbreviated because of the pandemic — and thanked everyone involved in the event’s organization.
Brittany Meronk, Sylvania Recreation’s venue and events manager, led the event’s organization and said this was the first of many great events to come in the summer lineup.
“We’re back,” Ms. Meronk said.
Some attendees hoped the ceremony would have followed the tradition of years past.
Marine Sgt. Tom Jones — who enlisted to serve in Vietnam immediately after graduating Sylvania High School in 1966 — and Army Capt. Rodger Thebeau — a demolitions expert and veteran of operations in Grenada, Panama, the first Persian Gulf war, and Afghanistan — were disappointed no wreath was laid in the water to honor Marines and Navy veterans, as was done in previous years.
Ms. Meronk said the wreath this year was laid in front of the city administration building.
She added that Monday’s parade had the largest turnout she had seen in six years.
First Published May 31, 2021, 7:38 p.m.
