Looking Forward but Looking Back

We had ourselves a great weekend weather-wise across the region and neighbors in Greeneville put their nice weather to good use with a great turnout last Saturday to clean up the Greeneville Recreation Area and Walking Trail, a pocket park that parallels the Shetucket River from the Eighth Street Bridge to the new Greeneville Dam.

Without getting all mathy on you, I'd estimate fifty or more people turned up in the course of the morning, filling between sixty and eighty heavy-duty extra-large trash bags and about twenty five recycling bins. At times all you could see was elbows and another body part we'll leave unsaid, as we worked from the parking area down to the river banks to get started on turning the area into a destination for hikers and picnickers.

Thanks to the firemen of the Greeneville Fire Station, we even had some extra muscle for those unwanted tires and discarded bedding materials. By eleven thirty, it was time to give pizza a chance and to savor the success of relying on no one other than a neighbor while working together to fix a problem.

Last year after the One City Clean Up of Downtown we had a carnival at the waterfront and sometimes there's a lot to be said for history repeating itself as the Norwich Rotary Carnival returns to Howard  Brown Park starting tomorrow at 5 PM through the holiday weekend ending Monday night at eleven. For all the times you've sighed and complained about nothing to do in Norwich, here's a chance to prove to yourself otherwise.

Try your skills at the games of chance, enjoy the concessions and the food offerings and make sure to check out the Ferris Wheel and the other rides. And the carnival is a perfect excuse for a stroll along the river to inspect the progress on construction of the ice cream pavilion (sounds classier that way, doesn't it?) and to stop into one of the growing number of great eateries in Chelsea for fine food and dining either before or after enjoying the Carnival.    

And while the Carnival is a great signal to start the summer season that kicks off with Memorial Day, next Monday morning at 10, in a far more traditional observance, the Taftville VFW Post 2212 and American Legion Post 104 will honor those who sacrificed their lives for our freedom in a commemoration at Memorial Park in Taftville.

Every year the ceremony honors a resident of Taftville who lost his life as a result of a wartime casualty. This year’s remembrance is of Machinist Mate Second Class Frederick Hassler. Petty Officer Hassler was a Taftville native who succumbed from his wounds at the New London Naval Hospital, October 3, 1918.

Some history behind the history of the ceremony: the two posts use Memorial Park to host this event and welcome guests and residents every year who are not even aware Memorial Park is a City of Norwich park. The property was previously owned for many years by the American Legion's Peter Gallan Post 104 before being gifted to the city.

The ten o'clock start time allows anyone planning to attend the noon's Memorial Day Parade on Broadway ample time to participate in both events reminders to all of the large and small sacrifices that have been made and are still being made by those in our armed forces, proving again that celebrities make headlines but heroes make a difference.
-bill kenny