The annual Independence Day Celebration held on Sunday, June 30 by the Escalon Covenant Church brought out several people even though the sun was putting out the heat.
The event started at 5 p.m. and although the heat of the day still lingered many people from the community came out to celebrate Independence Day early. The suggested donation amounts of the tickets were $3 per person and a maximum of $10 for a family.
The donation included a barbecue dinner of hamburgers, hot dogs, chips, watermelon and chili. They had a sno cone station that offered the icy treats in a variety of flavors like passion fruit, cherry, and lime. Guests seemed to make their way to the sno cone station quite often to help keep cool.
The DJ kept the crowd entertained with a variety of music.
There were two different bounce houses for the kids to enjoy and several of them lined up for them.
As you walked around the park you could see several people with their face painted and some were very patriotic.
There were two watermelon eating contests, one for youngsters and one for the adults. Eleven year old Garrett Bryan won the first contest and Trenton Busch a soon to be sophomore at Escalon High won the second one. They both received a t-shirt as their prize.
The other activity that had the whole family out on the grass was the water balloon toss. Each person had to partner up with someone else and get in a line. The guests all lined up and with every catch the other person had to take a step back. Once the balloon popped the duo was out of the game.
They had a raffle and several prizes were given away.
Marion Van Vliet, administrative Pastor from the Escalon Covenant Church helped organize the event at the Escalon Community Park. Everyone who worked the event were volunteers that signed up for shifts to work the food line, barbecue, supervise the bounce house, and many other places they were needed.
The evening ended with a bang from a nice firework display that all the families enjoyed.
“We want to come out and love our community and love our neighbors and be together,” said volunteer, Cheryl Degerman. “With a small town, I think it’s very important to stay connected.”
