Yellow Pages
BURLINGTON—An EA-6B Prowler roared overhead Saturday, flying west over Fairhaven Avenue to start Burlington’s annual Veterans Day parade.
As the radar-jamming jet from Whidbey Island Naval Air Station zipped across the sky, a burst of applause broke out among people on the sidewalk.
Melissa Willard came to the parade with three generations of family members and a friend. All of them Burlington residents, they came downtown Saturday morning to support the veterans.
Willard’s husband Terry and their 12-year-old son participated in the parade, as they have for the past five years. Terry Willard and his brother Dave Willard are both Vietnam veterans.
“My husband did two tours in Vietnam,” Melissa Willard said.
Dave Willard said he’s attended the veterans parade every year for about 40 years, since he was in his 20s.
Parade watchers clustered on both sides of Fairhaven watched as veterans and other participants marched or rode in vehicles between Walnut Street and Skagit Street. A count of the crowd wasn’t available. The parade ended at Maiben Park.
Antique and modern military vehicles, motorcycles and classic cars drove slowly along the route. Candy was tossed from people in the cars. A Boy Scout group threw red balls to children.
The Prowler made a second pass over the parade route, rumbling through the gray sky.
This year’s parade lacked the brief stop at the American Legion Hall’s memorial for fallen soldiers that had occurred in past years.
Both Melissa Willard and Dave Willard said that the veterans marching in the parade offered their thanks to the people watching. The veterans’ gratitude impressed Melissa Willard.
“It’s so nice,” she said. “It’s so wonderful for people to drop their barriers.”
With their lights flashing, the city’s firetrucks ended the parade.
