The Fourth of July doesn’t officially arrive until Sunday. That’s when fireworks will undoubtedly light the night sky, the heavenly aroma of barbecue will fill the air here, there and everywhere and it will be easier to find a snowflake than someone not wearing red, white and blue.
But to stop by the Brainerd Golf Club for the Brainerd Women’s Golf Association’s sixth annual Firecracker Invitational on Monday morning was the next best thing to experiencing the Fourth.
Before the clock had struck 8 a.m., all matter of patriotic music blared from the loudspeakers, including the Wright Brothers’ classic lyrics “Thank God for Chevrolet, Harley-Davidson and RCA,” from their 1980s hit “Made in the USA.”
Near the first tee stood Larry Palmer, David Mullins, David Sherrill and Jim Grisard, all proud members of American Legion Post 95 in East Ridge, all dressed in starched uniforms, all of them ready to lead a group of 88 women in the Pledge of Allegiance after Grisard deftly played “Call to Colors” on his bugle and before Mullins, Sherrill and Palmer fired off a three-gun salute to signal the start of the event.
Noted Palmer with the pride and respect for the American flag that one might expect of a Vietnam vet as he surveyed more than a dozen of them hanging off the Brainerd clubhouse: “They’re all displayed properly, just the way you’re supposed to. You’d be amazed how many people don’t know that.”