FELLSMERE — The City of Fellsmere celebrated its 102nd birthday at the Old Fellsmere School grounds and invited the residents to take part in the festivities, which started with pancakes and ended with a pageant.
In between was the quintessential Fellsmere Parade, complete with a Clydesdale-drawn carriage and airboats, that ran up one side of Broadway and down the other.
“I loved it,” said Fellsmere Day Grand Marshal Miss Wanda Szeman. “You couldn’t have had a better day.”
And to be in that horse-drawn carriage in the parade? “The only thing better would have been to ride them!” she said, referring to the horses themselves.
The Fellsmere Boys and Girls Club got the festivities started off right with a hearty pancake breakfast served up at the Community Center. Next came the parade, followed by the Grand Marshal Presentation on the steps of the Old Fellsmere School – now Fellsmere City Hall.
“I’ve known Miss Wanda since I was this big,” Fellsmere Mayor Susan Adams told the crowd, lowering her hand to about knee height. She added that there were many a time when Miss Wanda had saved her from getting into trouble.
For more than two dozen years, Miss Wanda has been a key part of Fellsmere, Mayor Adams said.
“It’s very rewarding to have such dedicated residents,” she said.
“This is what small towns do,” Miss Wanda said, accepting a plaque from Mayor Adams. “We are the greatest small town.”
New to the birthday bash this year was the Cake Walk – an event that had been dropped some years ago due to a lack of sponsorship. This year, the Fellsmere Beautification Committee – which puts on the celebration – was able to bring the event back.
One of the dessert winners was Blanca Gomez, who was quite happy with her pecan ring. Eyeing the sweet treat, she said she would definitely be sharing it.
“We had fun,” Gomez said of playing the game.
Committee Chair Amber Cerda surveyed the crowd that sprawled across the lawn and into the park and smiled.
“Things are going great,” she said. “It’s a great crowd, a beautiful day.”
The day wrapped up with the Little Miss Fellsmere Pageant, in which five girls and a miniature pig named Miracle competed. Miracle drew good-natured laughs from the crowd but no votes from the judges.
Instead, the 4-person panel of judges named 6-year-old Layla Isabel Ruan 2013 Little Miss Fellsmere, helping her dream come true.
One of the two questions each contestant had to answer was – “Why do you want to be Little Miss Fellsmere?”
“Because it is my dream for me to be Little Miss Fellsmere,” Ruan told the judges prior to them tallying up scores.
The other question – “What do you like most about Fellsmere?” garnered this response from Ruan: “We are all just one big family.”