Thursday, July 2, 2009
breakbox
Who: Lawrence citizens
What: Celebration of Independents fireworks festival
When: 3 p.m.
Where: Watson Park, located on 7th street between Kentucky and Tennessee streets.
Why: Live music, food from a variety of local resturants, raffle for prizes
Festival Schedule
Live Music:
4:00-5:30 - Crumpletons
6:00-7:30 - Truckstop Honeymoon
8:00-9:30 - Billy Ebeling and the Late to Dinner Band
9:45 - Fireworks
Lawrence Original Resturants with boothes at event:
23rd Street Brewery,
Johnnys Tavern,
Set’em Up Jack’s,
Ten,
Zig and Mac’s,
Biggs BBQ,
Buffalo Bob’s Smokehouse,
Global Cafe,
Bambino’s,
Genovese,
Paisanos,
La Parilla,
Local Burger,
Marisco’s,
Zen Zero,
India Palace,
Wheat State Pizza
A group of 17 locally owned and independent restaurants, known as the Lawrence Originals, will sponsor this year’s fireworks festival, which has been deemed the Celebration of Independents.
The festival starts at 3 p.m. today at Watson Park, located on Seventh Street between Kentucky and Tennessee streets.
The Lawrence Originals will provide food at the festival. Beer and wine will also be available and live music will start at 4 p.m. with local favorite, The Crumpletons.
The fireworks show will start at 9:45 p.m. presented by the Lawrence Jaycees, an organization that has been putting on fireworks shows for 54 years.
Gary Saathoff, president of the Lawrence Jaycees, said the Jaycees had a tough time with fundraising this year after losing its major sponsor, Emprise Bank.
The Lawrence Originals heard the Jaycees lost its sponsorship and, having put on a successful food festival last year, decided to sponsor this year’s event. Saathoff said he estimated 30,000 to 40,000 people watched the fireworks last year.
“The Fourth of July is the reason why I joined the Jaycees,” Saathoff said. “To be able to do fireworks.”
Doug Holiday, president of the Lawrence Originals and owner of Biggs BBQ, said the Lawrence Originals wanted to sponsor the event because community events were important.
“We’re Lawrence and we want to have something for Lawrence,” Holiday said. “It’s going to be uniquely Lawrence and how much more unique can it be than having restaurants who are local and in Watson Park. It’s natural.”
Holiday said one of the conditions for sponsoring the event was that the festival had to be brought back downtown.
“Last year it was out at the lake and a lot of people didn’t care for it out there, thought it was kind of a bad deal,” Holiday said. “It’s for Lawrence. It’s not for Clinton reservoir. Watson Park is a part of Lawrence.”
Constance Wolfe, festival coordinator, said an important part of the festival would be the option to become a part of the Lawrence Give Back Card program, which donates money to local charities.
Wolfe developed the program, which started in February and has already generated $12,000 in charitable donations. The card can be found at any of the Lawrence Original’s restaurants and will be available at the festival.
With the card, 5 percent of purchases at a Lawrence Original restaurant is donated to a local charity of choice. If used at Checkers, 1 percent of the total purchase is donated. The card also earns points for every $1 spent at a Lawrence Original restaurant or every $5 at Checkers. Upon reaching 200 points, $10 is put onto the card for future purchases.
Holiday said the Lawrence Humane Society would receive a check for $5,000 from the program.
Wolfe said the program had already generated more than a million dollars of spending in the community.
Holiday said keeping the festival local was important to stimulating the local economy.
“If we weren’t doing it, there wouldn’t be one,” Holiday said. “The people would be going to Oskaloosa or Eudora or Topeka or Kansas City.”
— — Edited by Kristen Liszewski
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