The Town That Forgot to Celebrate
Kennewick's editor warns that civic apathy is turning the community into a ghost town, one canceled event at a time.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
In September 1915 there was a Fifth Annual Grape Carnival. The months rolled around and the time came to lay plans for a Sixth Annual Grape Carnival. The matter was taken up by the Commercial club. There was a little talk pro and con, mostly 'con.' Then somebody made a motion that the grape carnival be shelved. There were some indifferent ayes, a scattering 'no' or two, and the grape carnival was placed languidly on the shelf. Later there was a mild protest from the Valley club, and the carnival question was reconsidered. There was some more talk, some more indifferent ayes, some more scattering noes and again the grape carnival was 'sat' on the shelf and this time it had glue on its 'sitter.'
A few more months rolled by. The weather waxed warmer, the roads grew dustier, and the times sleepier. A circus... unloaded a prize-fighter, a wrestler, a giraffe and a monkey in Pasco. Then we awoke. We split the kindling the night before, hurried up breakfast an hour, hustled thru the morning work, made a collar-wilting run to catch the special train or hung onto the running board of some friend’s automobile as it sped to the ferry. We were well paid for the effort... we decided to make a day of it.
Kennewick’s history is replete with instances of a fine public spirit. No town ever had a more loyal lot of citizens. But the silence of our present community life has been so prolonged as to become oppressive and the monotony of indifference and inaction has been so pronounced as to become ominous. To thrive, community spirit must be given exercise—it must be let play as well as made to work. Disuse renders it stale—dry-rots its fabric—and leaves the community to lead a sort of tumble weed existence which leads anywhere but to a place on the map.
“To thrive, community spirit must be given exercise—it must be let play as well as made to work. Disuse renders it stale.”
This editorial captures a timeless anxiety in small-town life: the fear that if a community stops creating its own shared culture, it will simply fade away. Today's residents might recognize the same struggle in the effort to maintain local festivals amidst the pull of regional entertainment centers like Pasco or Richland.
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