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By LOU HATTER
Rappahannock New* Staff Writer
This Fourth of July celebration in Washington was billed as a transition year, and the event lived up to the advance notices.
After 27 years as the one-man dynamo behind the yearly patriotic festival of entertainment and fireworks, William Carrigan turned over the reins to a coalition of town volunteers. Although the novice organizers admitted to a few snags in the planning, they promised to learn from the mistakes and return next year.
“We’ve got an energetic group of people, with a lot of good ideas,” said Jim Thomasson, who served as “field marshal” during the evening program.
Washington Fire Chief Roger Roach, who coordinated the daytime activities, agreed. Citing communication among the different groups as the biggest problem, he pronounced the lesson learned and said the difficulty would be remedied next year.
But you couldn’t have told any of the estimated 5,000 people who gathered in the evening’s twilight on the lawn of Avon Hall that there were any problems. Judging from the acceptance given The Singing Word, the Arabian horse company, country dancers, and Trapezoid, the entertainment program which led up to the fireworks display went off without a hitch.
And, of course, the fireworks display was punctuated by the “Oohs!” and “Aahs!” of children young and old as the pyrotechnics lit up the skies over Washington to a symphonic accompaniment — another new wrinkle this year.
The baton is passed
Although Mr. Carrigan said last year that 1987 was his last year as sponsor of the evening’s entertainment, he agreed to serve as advisor to the committee which took over the event. Volunteers from the Washington Business Council, the Town Council, the Washington Volunteer Fire Department and the Rappahannock Association for the Arts and the Community coordinated the program this year.
“You are welcome here,” Mr. Carrigan told the crowd which filled his lawn, many of whom took him up on his invitation to bring picnic dinners and eat while enjoying the entertainment. “You have been welcome here for 26 years.”
“As John Adams said,” Mr. Carrigan continued, “ ‘You are the people.’ That’s what the founders were talking about in Philadelphia 212 years ago. The Continental Congress had in mind not their time, but our time. They had all the people of the world in mind — those who would come here to the world’s first free country.”
It has been their wish, and ours, Mr. Carrigan said, “for all generations of families who come to this country to raise their children. We wish them the same kind of inheritance we have received from the Founding Fathers.”
Mr. Carrigan talked about Clyde Baggarly, the lawyer and judge who moved Avon Hall from its original site on Gay St. to its present place on the hill above Avon Pond. “He made a very significant contribution to this town.”
Through his ownership of Avon Hall, Mr. Carrigan said, “Ramona and I have carried out Clyde Baggarly’s stewardship. We hope that we have performed some small service. We are sensitive to our responsibility, to take good care of this small piece of the Earth, to improve it if we can, and to pass it
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