The Cranbrook Tri-Schools Girls Bugle Band has been a fixture at city, regional and even international parades and ceremonies for 70 years.

And despite declining numbers in the current edition of the band, never before has the Bugle Band been more front and centre than this year’s Sam Steele Days Parade on June 18.

More than 200 past members, spanning seven decades,  gathered to march in the parade and take part in a reunion celebration at the Cranbrook Curling Club.

“It was a very touching moment,” stated city Coun. Angus Davis of seeing the long line of ladies, from girls in their teens to women in their 80s, riding and marching along the parade route.

Davis noted his wife is a band alumni, dating back to 1956, and they thoroughly enjoyed the reunion supper and entertainment, which included a demonstration by the current band and a rousing performance by the Kimberley Pipe Band.

Davis said it is incumbent on the city and its residents to try and find a way to keep the Bugle Band operating.

He asked that the city’s Health and Wellness Committee be tasked with looking into the lengthy history of the Bugle Band and “organize something to perhaps keep this institution going.

Cranbrook Chamber of Commerce manager Karin Penner, who as a band alumnus took her place in the parade after organizing another highly successful Sweethearts of Sam Steele Pageant the evening before, said she was astounded by the turnout of former band members.

“It was very special because the crowds along the parade route were so large,” she said.

“It choked you right up — that 70 years ago that band was created,” Angus said about a moment of reflection he experienced during the parade, which once again passed by thousands of residents and visitors lined two to eight deep along downtown streets.

Coun. Liz Schatschneider, a key organizer of the parade, pointed out that this year’s parade was a bit different because the honorary parade marshals always start the proceeding but “out band always comes at the end.”

And come this did. After dozens of floats, horse drawn conveyances, marching organizations and entertainment, came a flatbed truck laden with smiling, waving elder band members. And behind them, marching in rhythm and sync, with many high stepping, twirling batons, drumming and playing bugles, came 200 former band members.

Many had to dig deep into their memory banks to find the skills of baton twirling or marching, just when the parade got underway.

Former band member Carrie Schafer said she grabbed a baton at the last second and had to tackle the intricacies of keeping it spinning in her hand and not toward someone’s head as the procession moved out.

“It was fun but boy was I sore the next couple of days,” she said, echoing what other former band members laughingly noted during that evening’s dinner.

Schatschneider said she got a kick out of seeing her sister Janice (Caldwell-Sawley) marching in the parade.

“She was there with her double batons — just a twirlin’,” she beamed.

Ian Cobb/e-KNOW

Article Share