It's not your standard parade

The Polebridge Fourth of July parade is an event so subtle and hang-loose that it

borders on the Zen. Absolutely no one is in charge of anything.

The Polebridge Fourth of July parade is an event so subtle and hang-loose that it borders on the Zen. Absolutely no one is in charge of anything.

Three hours before show time - scheduled for high noon - the tiny North Fork town appeared deserted. There were, however, a couple of people wandering aimlessly in the road and a few Montana porch dogs hanging out in front of the Polebridge Mercantile.

Anna Hoffman, who was working behind the counter there, patiently explained that the only way you'd know whether there was actually going to be a parade was if you were in it. And that seemed to make perfectly good sense.

"It's a little piece of real independence on Independence Day," said Scott Johnson of Kalispell as he unloaded chairs from the back of his pickup, which was parked alongside the road with a good view of what he hoped would be the parade. It was his fifth year coming to Polebridge and he hadn't been disappointed yet.

At 10 a.m., there still wasn't much sign of anything paradelike, but the cars and trucks definitely were piling in to town. There were vehicles from Iowa, Tennessee, Texas, New Jersey and Illinois, right there alongside the usual Montana suspects.

Some of the veteran tailgaters debated whether or not to even discuss the event with someone who wasn't close kin.

"I don't know if we should tell the truth here," said Gary Riecke of Bigfork. "We don't want it to grow too much.

"You know, this whole thing is really most unusual. I mean, thousands of people coming to watch a parade that doesn't amount to anything at all."

"And worse yet," Riecke's brother-in-law, Darryl Parsons, reminded him, "it's the only parade you see twice. You watch it going down the road and you watch it coming back."

An hour left and there was a rumor of some guy staggering around on a pair of stilts down the road a piece.

It turned out the stilt walker was Don Bennett, president of the new Freedom Bank in Columbia Falls, who was suiting up as Uncle Sam.

There were more dogs in Polebridge on Monday morning than there were full-time residents of the town - a number rumored to be somewhere less than 100 souls.

At 11:45, Peter Moore, bartender at the Northern Lights Saloon and Cafe, wove in and around the people and animals, looking for likely candidates to be judges.

"I took it upon myself to do this because I noticed no one else was doing it," he said. "Which is pretty typical. Probably won't be much of a problem, though, because I think we've only got three floats. But then you never know."

The reviewing stand was a good 10 feet off the ground and supported by a couple of lodgepole posts that were in turn supported by the hydraulic potential of a nearby front loader. The only way to get up to the plastic chairs on top of the platform was via a shaky aluminum ladder.

Wes Edwards, one of those tapped to be a judge, was wearing a hat with a stuffed rainbow trout on the front of it.

"I'd rather be fishing," he said solemnly. "But I'm willing to fulfill my civic responsibility today."

By noon, hundreds of people lined the parade route on the main street into Polebridge.

Twelve noon straight up and the parade started, led by Uncle Sam - more than likely because he was the tallest person in town at that point, being on stilts and all.

He was followed closely by the Polebridge Volunteer Fire Service 1956 Ford truck, model Big Job F-800.

Shortly after them came the Runaway Brides Jogging Team in their white plastic skirts doing a less-than-poignant version of "Going to the Chapel."

It turned out to be just significant enough to get them the award for first place.

Other musical delights of the day included several happy people in a raft - on the back of a pickup - singing an off-key version of "Row, Row, Row Your Boat." And the most, er, professional, of the entertainers was a band called Seven Smart Fellers - also on the back of a truck, this one dragging the equivalent of a case of empty beer cans behind it.

Not to be overlooked was the Udder Red Hat Society of mad-hatted gentlemen in stunning frocks and full makeup. Some of them posed provocatively for pictures.

There was enough candy being tossed to the crowd to rot a full set of teeth.

In the most serious moment of the day, three veterans marched carrying a folded flag and signs that said, "Support our troops," and "The ultimate sacrifice for freedom."

It was a reminder, in the midst of the madness and magic, of exactly why we are able to celebrate such a Fourth of July each year.

Reporter George Kingson may be reached at 758-4438 or by e-mail at gkingson@dailyinterlake.com