Grand marshal's lifetime love of parades

In Marlo Finney Faulkner’s 81 years, she can’t remember a time growing up in the family’s Park Drive home in the Fort Grounds in Coeur d'Alene when she didn’t attend the Fourth of July parade.

“It was a hop and a skip across the City Park to the front of the Railways Express office (where the Independence Point parking lot is now) to watch the wonder of sound and color,” she recalled.

Her first participation in Coeur d’Alene’s parade was in the late 1940s when as a Blue Bird she and her friends marched wearing their navy blue uniforms of skirts, white blouses, light blue scarves, navy bolero vests and billed blue beanies.

Faulkner attended Coeur d’Alene Junior High School at Seventh Street and Montana Avenue, now G.O. Phippeny Park. She was a member of the band, under the direction of music teacher Gilbert Burns. She remembers him teaching her how to tie her black uniform tie in a Windsor knot. The marching band appeared in the parade wearing black pants and shoes with white shirts, black ties and white yachting caps.

In the 1950s, by the time Faulkner was at Coeur d’Alene High School on 15th Street, now Lakes Middle School, the marching band received a generous gift.

“The wonderful philanthropists of the Athletic Round Table (a private club in the Desert Hotel on Sherman between First and Second streets) raised money to outfit the entire CHS marching band in bright blue uniforms with gold trim and traditional stove-pipe hats,” Faulkner said. “We were so proud to wear those uniforms.”

The high school band marched in every Fourth of July parade along with the drum major, the Vikettes drill team and the cheerleaders. According to Faulkner, it was something everyone wanted to do, a badge of honor to perform for their home town representing their school.

Faulkner graduated from Coeur d’Alene High School with the Class of 1960 and went on to the University of Idaho. Her teaching career took her west, where she eventually married, became a mother and made a life.

“I was astounded upon returning home as an adult with my husband, Mark, and our two children, that the CHS band was no longer in the parade,” she said.

Through the years, Faulkner loved seeing the creativity of colorful community floats from around the region, the equine groups and the tumblers.

“We loved seeing the fire trucks, the politicians and the trucks,” she laughed. “In one parade we counted in excess of 17 semi-trucks hauling more trucks, not to mention multiple cement mixers.”

The last time Faulkner was a parade participant was 2000, volunteering to march with the Perfection-Nots, a group of former high school band members garbed in wacky costumes, who come together annually with the sole purpose of performing on the Fourth of July.

Faulkner tells the story: “A percussionist in junior high and high school, I had always marched with a snare drum. I loved being a part of maintaining the rhythm of the march. In 2000, I went to the practice the night before the parade. Wow. I had forgotten how heavy is a snare drum. With a bad knee waiting for replacement surgery, I knew halfway through the marching practice that I would never make it from the 15th Street start to the end of Sherman. Our former neighbor, Duane Hagadone, loaned me a wheelchair from The Resort. I sat in the chair, held the drum between my legs and my son, then a captain in Special Forces, wheeled me the length of the parade.”

In one of those “small world” circumstances, Faulkner's parents, Thelma and Captain John Finney, were named grand marshals of the Fourth of July Parade in the 1960s. A big storm blew in and the parade was canceled.

Fast forward over six decades later and Thelma and John Finney’s little girl, the one-time Blue Bird, will appear in the 2023 Fourth of July parade as grand marshal. The weather is forecast to be sunny and she won’t need to carry a snare drum while being pushed in a wheelchair. She’ll be riding in style in a convertible.

Humbled and grateful to have been selected for the honor, Faulkner said, “I’m holding up the family name!”

The Coeur d’Alene Chamber of Commerce selected Marlo Finney Faulkner as grand marshal of the 2023 American Heroes Fourth of July Parade. A lifelong Coeur d’Alene resident, Faulkner's impact on the community for decades encompasses the arts and education as well as dedicated service to a number of nonprofit boards.

The parade on Tuesday, July 4, begins at 10 a.m. at 15th and Sherman, traveling west to Northwest Boulevard.