Celebrate Plover to Focus on Family, Community
By Jacob Mathias
Plans for the 4th annual Celebrate Plover festival at Lake Pacawa Park are well underway and promise to bring back old favorites and something new.
The day-long festival on July 25 will kick off as usual with a tribute at the Korean War Memorial.
“We just feel it’s very important to honor and recognize our veterans, past and present, for the service that they’ve provided for our country,” said Plover Village Administrator Dan Mahoney.
A children’s parade will follow on the path around Pacawa Park and Mahoney said the event continues to grow in popularity and grow every year.
“That’ll change a little bit whereas it’s been more oriented just to children only we’re basically tweaking it so now it’s becoming more of a regular parade,” said Mahoney, who added if the parade continues to grow, village officials may need to move it off the park’s walking path and on to the street.
Other events for families:
- A children’s play area will be available with bounce house activities provided by Jake’s Jumpers out of Green Bay.
- Kidz Town will again be on site with free face-painting.
- Golden Sands Home Builders is hosting a free building activity to encourage parents and children to jointly construct a birdhouse.
- This year’s event will also feature a massive “Lake Pacawa Pounder” coed volleyball tournament from 8-11 AM. Organizers will have 63 nets installed on and around the Lake Pacawa Park soccer fields, where teams of four will compete for a grand prize of up to $10,000.
Teams can register for the tournament here.
The corporate center and craft fair will be open throughout the day. At the corporate center, 40+ local business will promote their services and sell wares. Mahoney said the craft fair will also have 40-45 vendors demonstrating and selling art.
“It’s their chance and our chance to show off [Plover] business,” said Mahoney. “I think we have some really unique businesses that a lot of people don’t know about.”
The annual fireworks show- a local favorite- will again dazzle with musically-coordinated visuals including some designed to reflect off Lake Pacawa, he said.
Returning again this year is the wildly-popular “water wars” between Plover and neighboring fire departments.
A food court will operate all day with Mexican and Chinese cuisine as well as typical festival food including cheese curds, burgers and sweet corn. Soda and beer will also be available for purchase.
Musical guests include variety band The Drovers and crooner Pat Keller, while country band Grand Union will close out the night.
A full Celebrate Plover schedule can be found here.