It is already here, we were talking about some of the weather forecast for one of the
events coming up. And I do want to know, don't, don't tell me I can't take it. I got my
heart. It's palpitating it. Tell me Wednesday. My doctor said I can't deal with anxiety. Don't tell me the
one. Now, some of the events are at festival park or indoors in Memorial Hall to their indoors.
Yes, but during the summer, yeah, a lot of them are out there. They're out stores. So I'm looking at
this giant. We've got, you know, quite the impressive lineup of events this year. So let's start
off with coming up tomorrow, I guess, right? The sneaker ball. Sneaker ball. Yes, that's a great
event. That is kind of kicks off the Juneteenth celebrations here in Racine. So all the folks that are
coming to festival hall dressed in their in their best and their finery and then wearing their
sneakers for comfort. So that's why it's called sneaker ball. You know, I've seen weddings where
the the bride and groom are in tuxedos and a beautiful wedding dress in there wearing, you know,
Nike shirt up there. That's okay. I guess you want to be comfy. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah,
okay. Dance all night. Okay. Now one of the events that it's not your event, but it's still on
your grounds. We're seeing Harbor Fest and we're going to talk about that coming up a little while
at 735. That's huge. It's back after how many years? The last Harbor Fest was 2007. My third
you're going to say in the 19 ought six. Remember, well, it was on the board of directors of that
Harbor Fest. So yeah, 2007. Now that's 13th and 14th. June 13th and 14th. Now the Lighthouse
run is coming up. This year is not going past my house. I used to put up a hose on a ladder
and turn it on spritz. So it just like it was a mist. That's a great time on people. And people
used to stay underneath it. And one day there was a cop across the street, pulled up in his car,
and he's staring at it. It was wrong. He said, what a genius idea. I'm just looking. I never
said something to make a little shower like that. And we've lighthouse run has always been on
Father's Day weekend. So in that is going to coordinate with Harbor Fest in the morning. So
the lighthouse run entrance can stay and enjoy Harbor Fest after they return from the run.
The run has 10 mile competitive for men and women with cash prizes and then various levels of
fun runs and things of that nature. There's something different from all the other years.
Used to meet at the YMCA. Yeah. And the YMCA is not there anymore. No. It's a
It's gradually coming down. It's a ruffle pile. Yeah. The mayor in here. They let him hit one of the
first hits right and sat down. Yeah. Well, this is the 47th year. So there's a lot of history
with it. And we're seeing a lot of changes in those 47 years. So I used to watch. We have a little
cowbell. We ring when they used to come by my house and everything. And people said,
why don't you run? Well, I'm getting old. And here comes some 90 year old guy dragging in the
break. Yeah. And I felt ashamed of myself. Yeah. Yeah. I'm entering the the 50 yard old football
player level. So that's I'm going into the 10 feet walk. Yeah. From my fourth square. Okay. Now
here's something brand new. And we haven't talked about this on the air yet at all because it was
just finalized recently. Yes. Within the last 10 days. And for the first time in what 30, 40 years,
the received concert band won't be at the receiving zoo this year. They're going to be at
festival park festival park. Yeah. We're very excited. You know, the receiving concert band has
been a received institution for 103 years. And as you said, it had been at the zoo for many, many
years. But we're excited to have them as have us as their new home starting on July 6th. So
they'll be it's a free concert. And then they'll also something a little different from the zoo.
They'll be bar service and concessions available. So folks are invited to come out and enjoy the band.
And you know, bring their their lawn chairs and things of that nature and just, you know,
have a great time under the tent at festival park. No, it's free with free parking.
Free everything. Yes. Just just throw on in and enjoy it concert. And now how does the rain?
And now I've been hosting the concert for about 15 years. Right. And only once in the 15 years
that I have to whisper in Mark Eichner's ear, the conductor and say, it's over. There was
lightning in the background. He is back to it. So we didn't see it. He didn't hear it. Sure.
And I said, it's over. Yeah. But we'll be under our large event. And anybody that's been
down near the grounds has seen it that you can't miss it. So we're rain or shine. So
all right. There you go. Yeah. No, no cancellations is here. We're going to go.
And that starts July 6th. The Racine Concert Band is now going to be at festival park.
I know people can still show up at the zoo. And there's nothing you'd do about it. I think
Beth Hyder will put a sign up. Yeah. I'm sure she will. Yeah. And we're going to, you know,
we've been hitting it hard. So folks don't press releases and things like that. But this is
really kind of our big announcement of it to a lot of the members of your audience. I'm sure
a regular attendees. And so we want to make sure that they find their way down on July 6th.
Now let's talk about historic memorial hall. And that was the site of the very first broadcast
of WRJN. Oh, amazing. Almost 100 years ago. It's in next year will be our 100th anniversary of
that broadcast on December 6th, 1926. And so we had a live band at the live orchestra at the
memorial hall. Yeah. That thinks the story. And you've got something coming up. There's
science of reading. What's that? Science of reading. It is a, it's designed for K through
fifth grade teachers. And it's just a day filled with resources and training and seminars and
things like that to allow the teachers to be a little more efficient as they're teaching the
youngsters how to read and you know, different techniques and things of that nature. So,
yeah, that's going to be a great event to at Memorial Hall in July 10th.
Okay. We've got the big ones Salmon Arama. Now this went through it. They called it the big
fish something or a few years ago, the big whatever. And he went back to the original name Salmon
Arama. Because that's what everybody's still called it. Sure. Sure. What was that Salmon Arama,
the big one, as they, as they called it, but you know, it's the largest stuff fishing tournament
on the Great Lakes. And we're excited to have it back here at Festival Park for its second year
in its return July 11th through the 20th. So, anybody that's familiar with Salmon Arama knows
that there's competition in many different divisions, many different species of fish,
you know, shoreline boats, you know, all kinds of different categories that you can win.
Some really amazing prizes in. Come down into the raffles. Great music all weekend.
It's just a recene tradition that has returned to Festival Park and we're excited to have it.
I only went fishing once in my lifetime. Yeah. And it was in Salmon Arama. They took the radio
people out to fish. Okay. And I caught a fish. I know what to do. I said, what do I do? He said,
real him in about what do you mean, real? What am I going to say? Once I get him in, what do I do?
That round thing. I do that, but when I get him up, what am I supposed to do with him? I never touch
the fish. I'll put the nut under it and bring it in for you. I said throw him back. I don't
want to. This guy's got a family. What? Yeah. You didn't take it to homens and smoke it? No. No. No. Meanwhile,
there's some you little fish head with daddy. Go with daddy. Oh, there's daddy. He's been dead.
Daddy come track of a cotton slip. I don't want it. I don't want to make orphans down there.
Okay. Pop up crap supply sale. Now, this is also going to be a memorial hall. Yeah. And it's just
what it sounds like. It's kind of a day long, I guess, marketplace filled with people that are
into the crafting hobby coming out and buying their supplies and seeing what's new in that in that
hobby. And yeah, that'll be a memorial hall in July 19th. Well, you have to worry about two places.
We have three actually, you know, if you come festival hall festival park and memorial halls,
we've got three distinct venues and we've had days where we've had events at all,
three of them simultaneously. So man, I used to worry about running an aim and an FM combination.
All right. So that's a pop up crap sale. The Racine River Fest. Yeah. River Fest is actually
was my favorite event last year. It is a collaboration amongst all the yacht clubs along the river.
Events happening all day long, not only at festival park, but also at fifth street yacht club,
harbor light yacht club down at the chart room. Racine yacht club. So dragon boat races.
Oh, the dragon boat races. Yeah, the dragon boat races right there in the river.
Cardboard yacht races, the duck races, and then music at I know harbor lights having music,
we will have music at festival park in the evening along with fireworks later in the evening.
So just a day of great activities on the river. There'll be a Venetian night for all the
boat owners and the harbor to get involved in and decorate their boats and parade them up and
down the river. That's always fun. And so it's in its second year and it's just a great collaboration
amongst all the businesses and the yacht clubs along the river. And that's August 2, August 2nd.
Yep. Fiesta de Latino is coming up August 8th. August 8th through the 10th. And it's,
you know, it's a family event and we think it's going to be probably our biggest event of the year.
It celebrates all the Latin cultures here in Racine, music, traditional dance, food,
everything related to that. And we're doing it in conjunction with the folks that run the
North Beach Pavilion. So it's a great partnership with them and, you know, carnival rides,
just a great day. And so we're very excited to have that back. That was something that
had happened at the park years ago in a different incarnation. And we're fortunate to have the
partnership with Felix and Marina or Jose and Maria to put this together.
Also in August, August 16th, the park beers are. This is a festival park.
You know, this is a brand new event. This is something we're doing in conjunction with
with Wisconsin Tavern League. And it's just a day to celebrate, you know, Racines,
you know, bar culture, all the bars, all the top bar owners will be involved, music,
spirits, food, games, tournaments, probably a bags tournament, things of that nature.
Well, a lot of things still coming together with that event, but that is going to be the first
year event for us down at the park. I've mentioned this before. I've never had a beer in my life.
I taste it. I tasted it once. Yeah, I had never a full one. No, never a taste. I never
had just had to do anything for me. How much of a beer drinker? I like my brown liquor.
That's one thing that's known about me. I used to drink a lot of soda. And my wife mentioned to me
about nine years ago, you drink it too much. So I stopped all soda. Okay. And last week, two
weeks ago, I stopped all little Debbie cakes. So I'm shutting off my life. But which one was your
favorite? I say, don't sleep on the zebra cake. That's all they made the little zebra rolls.
They had, you know, you know, you want to roll the, you know, the Swiss rolls, but they made
them the zebra and it'll bigger. I got to track those down and anything lemon. They do it for
mother's day. They do the lemon ones. Okay. You know, I got my birthday this year. My wife bought
me a, she bought it last March, I guess, during the Girl Scout cookie sale. Seven boxes of
limited Girl Scout cookies. And she hid them. And she brought them out for my birthday last week.
And gave me all seven boxes. I'm already through two. I was going to say and you killed them in 10
minutes. Yeah. I got some of two of them already. Bacon improves fast. Bacon everything. Bacon can
take everything's bacon. Oh, yeah. You put bacon on it. Their folks are coming. This is a
partnership with the Racine Journal Times. And they're actually doing their first bacon fast
out at the Walworth County Fairgrounds this weekend. But this is the first time that they're
bringing a similar event to festival parks. So it's September 6th and 7th. So it's all things bacon.
Bacon oriented food selections, liquor, drinks, live music. It's just going to be a fantastic
thing. And it also coordinates with the 15th annual bacon and five kegs run that will originate
from festival park. Jim Gaffing goes a whole thing on bacon. He said everything's better in bacon.
Bippity Boppity Bacon. That's true. He said, you know, this little chestnuts. Nobody would ever
eat those if they didn't wrap them. Oh, yeah. Absolutely. Would I eat water chestnuts?
Nobody would eat that. That's why they wrap it in Bippity Boppity Bacon. I don't even like them in
my Chinese food. You know, we got we got those big carton, big packages of crunched up bacon,
real bacon, but they crunched it. I'm like putting it on everything. Yeah. Yeah. Never can go wrong
with Bippity Boppity Bacon. Stand down. That's a military term. Stand down is a fantastic event that
that benefits, you know, all the veterans. It's open to the public and there will have multiple
vendors that will come through. That's on September 13th at Festival Hall. And it's really just a
veteran service thing. So veterans can come through get assistance with, you know, figuring out some
of their benefits, job placement, you know, any any type of veteran services that veterans would
need is available during stand down. So that's a that's a great collaboration with the
Rasing County Veteran Services and finally for now party on the pavement party on the pavement
coming up in September. That is a long held routine tradition that, you know, whether it seems
to always be good for party in the pavement. So that's something that the DRC closes down
Main Street for just a big festival. And then we will also have a run called pound the pavement
that will leave from festival park also the morning of that. We had a guy working here once
when they first did party on the pavement the first time. He said, I don't understand this.
So they built this beautiful new concrete road downtown. They spend months with dust and closing
down businesses. They built this beautiful and the first thing they're going to do is shut it down
to drop it. Nobody could drive on it. He said, I don't understand that. You think of the
celebration of cars driving on it. You're walking on it. Yeah. Party on the pavement.
All right. So if somebody wants to get a list of the events that we just talked about, we're
going to go to festivalpark.com and go to the events page. I hit the drop down. You'll see the
list of all the events. You can buy tickets. If it's a ticketed event and then see all the line
up of all the different activities, different band lineups, things of that nature. If I could
just mention hot harbor nights every Thursday night throughout the summer here. We will be there
tonight with a great band called Velvets Toledo that is hosted by the Racine Hog chapter
and then come out and all the all the proceeds from the concessions go to the marine
detachment 346. So come on out. We'll have bike parking in the park. So no reason not to come
down. The weather's going to be gorgeous and we want to sail the lighters down there.
It's going to be nice. You can relax. Yeah. Yeah. This is when we don't have to sweat too much.
Very good. Kevin McDougal from 5K event. Thanks, Don. I got to have you in throughout the
summer because we have to be talking about all these, right? We're going to have you back again and
again and again and again.
