Uniontown officials expect large turnout for Americanism Day event
In what is the biggest annual parade in downtown Uniontown, veterans from Fayette County and the surrounding area will lead a long line of more than 300 marching units in the 73rd Americanism Day celebration on Monday. The procession of veterans, police, fire departments, high school marching bands, Girl Scouts and Boy Scouts, local officials, dancing schools, motorcycle groups and classic cars will line up at 6 p.m. and embark at 7 p.m.
Starting at Uniontown High School, the parade will travel east on Fayette Street, turn right on to Morgantown Street, turn right on to Main Street and turn left on to North Gallatin Avenue and then break up after passing the reviewing stand in front of American Legion, Lafayette Post 51.
The city decorated downtown streets with American and POW/MIA flags last week in preparation for the event.
“It’s going to be a long parade,” said organizer Joe T. Joseph of the Legion.
It has a history of being a lengthy parade dating to the first one in 1934. That inaugural Americanism Day parade had 5,000 school children marching with Legion members, ethnic groups dressed in native costumes, labor unions and other organizations.
It happened during the Great Depression after the coal strike in 1933. A group wanted to have a May Day parade to coincide with an annual May Day parade in Communist Moscow.
Uniontown police were worried that there would be trouble whether they granted or denied permission for the parade.
Legion members, police and others got together and worked out a solution – an Americanism Day celebration.
Reportedly, 15,000 people marched in the 1944 parade and an estimated 40,000 spectators attended the 1970 parade.
Monday’s parade features retired Maj. Gen. H. John “Jack” Mier, a Uniontown native, and Fayette County Commissioner Joseph A. Hardy III, a World War II veteran, as co-marshals. Army veteran Victor Kozares of Hopwood, who was awarded numerous medals for fighting in the Korean War and WWII, will be in the lead pack of vehicles.
On Memorial Day, Kozares will be inducted into the Hall of Valor at Soldiers and Sailors National Military Museum and Memorial in Pittsburgh.
Jim Hales, American Legion state commander, will be the guest speaker at an invitation-only dinner before the parade. Legion state adjutant Kit Watson, Legion state auxiliary president Joan Reinoehl, past Legion commanders and Mier will also speak at the dinner.