HOLLY — A Carry Nation-themed float won first place in the Holly Days parade Saturday after its costumed temperance crusader seized control of the tow vehicle and drove the entire entry through the festival beer tent, a move judges later determined demonstrated an exceptional commitment to historical accuracy.
The entry had begun as a conventional historical float, with decorative saloon doors, a whiskey barrel and a costumed Carry Nation waving a wooden hatchet at spectators. Witnesses said the presentation changed upon reaching the downtown festival area, when Nation spotted the beer tent, ordered the driver into the passenger seat and informed him they had reached the reenactment portion of the route.
Organizers initially attempted to stop the float before remembering that Holly Days traces its roots to the former Carry Nation Festival, which commemorated the temperance crusader’s 1908 visit to Holly and confrontation with the town’s drinking establishments. Officials allowed the performance to continue while they determined whether destroying the beer tent constituted a parade violation or simply unusually thorough historical interpretation.
“I’ll be honest, once she took the wheel, it was the first time all morning I felt like anyone really understood the assignment,” said Holly resident Leonard Mercer, who had been waiting for a beer when the float arrived. “A lot of the other entries had costumes. This one had research.”
The float was awarded first place following a brief judges’ conference beside several overturned folding tables. Organizers said future Holly Days parade applications will include a new section requiring historical entries to specify whether they plan to depict local history, reenact local history, or resume it from the point where it was interrupted.