Patriot parade

July 4, 2012

When Edith Pirkle moved from Lake Norman to Maiden, she said she felt like the town was missing something.

"The town didn't have a parade," she said. "I thought, 'What could I do?' So I started a a parade for the Fourth of July."

Seventeen years later, the one-time event that welcomed a handful of walking participants draws hundreds to downtown Maiden. Riding cars, trucks, tractors, four-wheelers — just about anything that moves — citizens don their favorite red, white and blue colors to wave flags and wind through the towns streets.

"We have fund doing it," Pirkle said. "We get out here and just have a big time."

Pirkle insists the event isn't about her.

"I'm not it," she said of the parade. "The people are it. The town of Maiden is it."

And those patriotic people marching along Maiden's Main Street understand what the event — just like Independence Day — is all about.

To read more of this story, pick up the weekend print edition of Catawba County's community newspaper, The Observer News Enterprise, at newsstands throughout the county. Be sure to visit The O-N-E's Facebook page for photos from the parade.