A Picnic For Almost Everyone St. Patrick’s Day Parade Fund-Raiser Draws Thousands, Er, Hundreds

Leave it to the Irish to serve up burgers, Bruce Springsteen and a bit of blarney.

The Friendly Sons of St. Patrick picnic Sunday at Mission Park attracted, well, everyone. The Sons of Norway, the Sons of Italy, Mr. Kool-Aid and McGruff the Crime Dog all were there. Mayor Jack Geraghty showed up, and so did the mounted police.

The picnic theoretically was a fund-raiser for the St. Patrick’s Day parade, but it was more of a party.

“I shouldn’t say a fund-raiser because we lost our shirt on it,” said Bill Flanigan, chairman of the parade and one of three picnic organizers.

Flanigan, with a stereotypical Irish twinkle in his bright blue eyes, has a gift for exaggeration. He first estimated the crowd at the picnic at 3,500 people.

Few wanted to cross Flanigan. They’d estimate the crowd at 500, but they didn’t want their names attached.

Ed McDonald guessed that 300 people were there. He laughed when he heard Flanigan’s estimate.

“Oh, come on,” McDonald said. “Not that many. I’ve been running staging areas for years.”

“Isn’t that called blarney?” asked his wife, Carol McDonald.

Flanigan downsized his estimate to 900. The crowd ate about 300 burgers and another 300 hotdogs. This was not traditional Irish fare.

“Corned beef and cabbage?” asked Flanigan, wrinkling his nose. “I can’t stand that at all. I was raised on that stuff.”

At the picnic, there were bagpipers and Celtic dancers, volleyball and softball, chips and soda. The kids scrambled for candy, waited for raffle drawings and were simply too busy for the egg toss.

Lloyd Magnuson, a past president of Sons of Norway, said he’s been to Ireland twice, but he hasn’t been to Norway. His wife’s Irish, but she’s the financial secretary of the Sons of Norway.

Magnuson first went to Ireland in 1943, when he was fighting in World War II.

“Great country then, I thought, too,” Magnuson said. “Lots of beer.”

There was no beer Sunday. There was music diverse enough to please all of the people, a few at a time. It was country versus rock, and Ireland versus the world.

“Every third song we play is Irish,” Flanigan said. “Almost nobody can take Irish music all day.”

Andy Kelly and Mike Cannon could. They grumbled about Bruce Springsteen and the Georgia Satellites. They wanted more Irish music.

They heard more country music than you could shake a two-step at. Children learned to line dance. Some adults already knew how.

We’ve got the garbage of the world, as far as music goes, said Kelly, who wore a green baseball cap proclaiming: “You can always tell an Irish man … but you can’t tell him much!”

DJ Jeff Sauer, in cowboy boots and a cowboy hat, sighed when asked about the music mix.

“Some people want to hear rock, classic rock, country, the old Irish songs,” Sauer said. “If I just play Irish, other people will come up and say, ‘You’re putting us to sleep.’ You have to reach a happy medium.”

Just then, Sean Kelly, wearing a sticker proclaiming, “Andy Kelly’s grandson ‘Sean,”’ asked Sauer: “Are we going to play some Irish music? I’ve been told to come over here and ask.”

Finally, “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling” and “Kerry Dance” were played, back to back.

“I like the Irish music,” Cannon said. “You enjoy the rare things.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Color Photo