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50 °F Forecast | Road Cams Friday, April 8, 2005 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion Tempo AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map SPECIAL SECTIONS Since We Asked Outdoor Journal Menu Guide How To Guide Health Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Real Estate Guide Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Wedding Guide Passport to the Rogue Valley SHOP OUR VALLEY AutoFinder HomeFinder JobFinder Classified Place an ad TOP JOBS EXTRA Ashland News NIE Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People Volunteer Moving here? eSouthernOregon CUSTOMER SERVICE FAQ's Advertise with us Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend April 8, 2005 Patty Watkins, left, and Debbie Fortune put a yellow ribbon on a �Wizard of Oz� float sponsored by Sherm�s Thunderbird/Food 4 Less, expected to be one of the more elaborate in this year�s Pear Blossom Festival Parade. Mail Tribune / Bob Pennell Labor of love For Pear Blossom Festival volunteers, the whole year is spent planning for the big day By BUFFY POLLOCK for the Mail Tribune For all the exhausted runners, waving babies and vendors hawking cotton candy and meat-on-a-stick, some 50-plus coordinators spend much of the year stressing, sweating and carefully calculating Medford’s signature event: the Pear Blossom Festival. This year’s 52nd annual festival on Saturday will be no different, except that it’ll grow just a bit as it has every year, and that when it’s all over, those coordinators will scrutinize every detail for improvements next year. From the huge running event to the pageant, parade and street fair, Pear Blossom creates a marathon for coordinators that would make the 10-miler look like a toddler’s play date. Bands of volunteers coordinate everything from security and power supply to parade lineup and Porta-Potty rental. Advertisement Take festival president Darcey Mann-Self, who began assisting two decades ago and has served as president for nine years. Mann-Self said her year-round role is marked by either planning for the festival or planning to plan more. In the preceding 11 months, themes are decided, T-shirts and posters ordered, sponsors lined up and pageants coordinated. Smaller details range from garbage can and Porta-Potty deliveries to thank-you letters and loaner cars for VIPs. The morning of the event, parade entrants start lining up at 7 — four hours early — as streets are blocked off for the 11 a.m. parade. Waiting areas are chalked off to coordinate 150 entries and 5,000 participants. Entries are coordinated by computer now, and Mann-Self shudders to remember a paper system that covered an entire wall. Color codes help keep things organized: vehicles, yellow; floats, blue; horses, orange; and so on. "It’s the only way," Mann-Self said. "You’ve got 150 entries and there’s no other way to do it and be organized and do it safely � there’s 20 Corvettes, 25 PT Cruisers, 15 bands of 150 to 200 kids each � it gets complicated!" As parade participants begin lining up, Pear Blossom Run founder and coordinator Jerry Swartsley — whose answering machine fearfully requests callers to leave no message as he and his wife, Zellah, are "up to their eyeballs in alligators" � is frantically signing in runners and pulling off final details before the first run at 7 a.m. For the Swartsleys, the weekend begins with eight hours of setup at the YMCA for runners to sign in. In the months before that, however, there are T-shirts and numbers to order and packets to put together for participants. "There’s a lot of guesswork," Swartsley noted. "People tend to put stuff off to the last minute." How do coordinators pull it all off? "You have to be a little bit crazy, I think," he said with a laugh. A stone’s throw from the START line, in Alba Park, the street fair — a labor of love for coordinator Joyce Loyd — creates an atmosphere all its own. The 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. fair offers entertainment for kids with pony rides and jump houses, food for hungry runners and afternoon shopping for festivalgoers. Loyd is entrusted with allocating power supplies, coordinating parking and security and, in the smaller details, ensuring one jewelry maker isn’t situated right next-door to another. "It gets pretty wild," said Loyd, who solicits participation from 700 vendors around the country each year, vying for the first 123 willing to commit. "We have people that have come for 12 years and they want their space back," she said. "I start planning in December and mail applications to returning vendors in January. � I have to go down every year and measure every inch of the park. Trees go in and out, things change. I have to figure booth sizes, where to put 10-by-10s, 10-by-20s � and assign all the power supply based on amperage." Volunteers and coordinators say despite the frenzy of festival planning, they haven’t a single complaint. "I’m just exhausted by the day of the event," Loyd said. "But when it all comes together, I absolutely love it. The people love it. The vendors have a ball� it is a lot of work but I look forward to it." Mann-Self agreed. "It’s a great feeling, knowing that the community enjoys this so much. It’s a huge sense of pride to put something on that everyone seems to enjoy so much," she said. "We do take it seriously but we have a lot of fun� it’s a lot of tradition and community spirit." If you go Here are some highlights of Saturday's Pear Blossom Festival in Medford: 7 a.m. — 5k run kicks off series of running events at Medford City Hall. The 1-mile Mayor’s Cup begins at 8 a.m., 10-mile run at 8:35 a.m., and 2-mile run/walk at 8:40 a.m. 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. — Street fair at Alba Park. 11 a.m. — Pear Blossom parade, starting at the intersection of Court and Edwards streets and Central Avenue. The parade follows Central Avenue to Main Street, where it turns west and heads to Alba Park. It ends two blocks past the park. The parade will air live on RVTV Channels 31 and 95 and will be rebroadcast at 6 p.m. Sunday on RVTV Channel 9. 4 p.m. — Gates open for the Pear Blossom Special at the Southern Oregon Speedway, featuring sprints, modifieds, pro stock, mini stock and Super 4 races. For more information, see today’s Tempo in the Mail Tribune, check out the Web site www.pearblossom.org or call 734-PEAR. Buffy Pollock is a freelance writer living in Medford. E-mail her at [email protected]. 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