Follow the light thud of a bass drum and the trill of a trumpet and you can fall in step with the annual Fourth of July parade in Edgartown. For outgoing parade grand marshal Fred B. (Ted) Morgan Jr., a marching band is the heartbeat of any parade.

 

“Without a band we’re lost,” Mr. Morgan said.

In a conversation with the Gazette last Friday, Mr. Morgan, his successor, Joseph E. Sollitto Jr., organizer Wanda Williams and two longtime parade participants from Camp Jabberwocky, Kim Ho and Cathy DiSciullo, reflected on their parade memories and favorite moments through the years.

Mr. Morgan said it begins with the band — specifically the Bay State Band and Colonial Navy Band.

“Without them it would be a disaster,” he said. “Trying to get a band here for the Fourth of July parade is almost impossible because they’re all tied up. Having them come every year is a godsend.”

Mr. Sollitto agreed.

“Who’s the most important person in a marching band? The bass drummer because he keeps the beat. When you hear it, you usually step with your left foot. But some of us are on the right foot as you get a little older,” he smiled.

The Dukes County clerk magistrate’s long association with the Fourth of July parade began in the 1970s as a member of the Edgartown Boys’ Club drum and bugle corps. A trumpet player, Mr. Sollitto said he would have enjoyed playing with the Vineyard Haven Band, but his duties as an Oak Bluffs police officer at the time meant he was unable to make the Sunday evening performances. The drum and bugle corps disbanded in the late 1980s due to dwindling participation.

“We really miss it,” Mr. Morgan said.

Ms. Williams, who is the Edgartown town clerk, remembered a year when one of the bands was missing and recorded music was used instead.

“It would play a little and then it would stop and restart — the great thing about a band is it keeps constantly playing,” she said.

The modern-day parade was founded in 1956 by the late Oscar Pease and Robert Convery, former commander of the American Legion, following a hiatus during World War II. Mr. Morgan has been part of the parade since 1969 when he retired from the U.S. Air Force. He announced last week that this would be his last year as grand marshal.

“When you think of the Edgartown parade, you think of Col. Ted Morgan,” Mr. Sollitto said.

Mr. Morgan deflected the praise. “It’s about the Vineyard and it’s about people working together — everyone having the same goal in mid to get things organized and get it started and participate,” he said. “It’s been a pleasure, really.”

The group talked about how the parade has changed through the years, although it is still very much a home-grown affair with people showing up at the last minute with their floats or in their antique cars.

“People are supposed to call in, but they don’t always. We never know until we get there who’s in the parade. Most of the time we’re pleasantly surprised,” Mr. Morgan said.

Ms. Williams, a U.S. Navy veteran, calls herself a relative newcomer; she has marched in the parade since 1988. She helps with staging and organizing things and keeps her sneakers on until the last possible minute, “because I don’t know if I’m going to have to chase somebody down.” She changes into her uniform in stages, stashing her heels in Mr. Morgan’s golf cart and slipping into them just before the marching begins. But she said this year she won’t be able to continue her long tradition of changing into her uniform at Leonora Bettencourt’s house; Mrs. Bettencourt died two years ago and the house was recently sold.

“I’ve always brought my uniform down, gone for a lobster roll at St. Elizabeth’s Church and come back to eat it before the parade,” Ms. Williams said. “I have to find someplace else to change my uniform. I’m considering the police station.”

And with all due respect to the marching bands, some may argue that the real heartbeat of the parade is Camp Jabberwocky. Ms. DiSciullo, 47 and a longtime camper at the venerable cerebral palsy camp, was 11 when she marched in her first parade. She remembers it like it was yesterday. Her fellow campers had rehearsed a routine, but her counselor had failed to mention that the parade route was two miles long.

“I did the whole thing, I didn’t even realize it,” she said. “It was hot and fun.”

She hasn’t missed a parade since.

In recent years the Camp Jabberwocky contingent and float were repositioned at the front of the parade, and it’s now up to the Jabberwockians to keep a steady pace.

“It makes a much better parade and I think they’re happy being in that position,” Mr. Morgan said.

“Oh, we love it,” Ms. DiSciullo said.

She paused to say there is one face she misses now — actress, friend and longtime Camp Jabberwocky supporter, Patricia Neal, who died two years ago.

“When I look up she won’t be there,” Ms. DiScuillo said.

Kim Ho, a Jabberwocky counselor, marched in her first parade in 1986 at the age of 16. Her brother was Ronnie Simonsen, a camp legend who died in 2010.

“He used to drag one foot and he walked the whole way and he’d be dripping with sweat and exhausted but he loved it,” Ms. Ho said. “It was always Ronnie’s highlight of camp. He loved the parade.”

“I think we all do,” Ms. Williams added.

Ms. DiSciullo doffed her hat to the team of counselors who work tirelessly on the floats.

“The counselors stay up all night the night before and really do a lot of work,” she said. “They don’t always get appreciated, but you can hear them late at night finishing it.”

Remarkably, the parade is almost never cancelled due to weather; Mr. Morgan can only remember one time.

“I remember that day as if it were yesterday,” he said. “I watched the floats come into the parade grounds and all of a sudden it started raining. Not just raining. Pouring. I swear I sat down and I had tears in my eyes because I had to cancel the parade.”

Mr. Morgan began to list the people who deserve credit for making it all run smoothly — the town highway department, the town police and fire departments, the Martha’s Vineyard Preservation Trust — and his list kept growing.

Mr. Sollitto added one more to the list.

“It wouldn’t happen if it wasn’t for Ted,” he said.

“You can’t do it alone, Joe,” Mr. Morgan replied.

Even with the changing of the guard, Mr. Sollitto vowed that one tradition will remain unchanged.

“When five o’clock is struck, the parade is underway,” he said. “That will continue.”