I\u2019ve been very clear about my love for one season, and that is summer. Besides the fact that I have a granddaughter named Summer, to me it\u2019s just the greatest season, hands down.<\/p>\n
Your chances of getting rocked by some cold or flu are greatly reduced. You wake up in the morning with the birds chirping and the bright sun shining through your bedroom window. We get to swim, ride bicycles, cookout, play golf and generally just enjoy a sun-filled, warm life.<\/p>\n
When I was a kid, summer was basically three things. First is waking up, not too early, and off to Muhlenberg playground. The Allentown playground system back then was heavenly. Nearly every playground across the city had some energetic, fun-loving college kids running activities throughout the day. The connection you built with the \u201cplayground instructor\u201d was a summer-long bond with college-aged instructors who were trying to make a little back-to-college money and were prime examples of what you wanted to be when you grew up. They were both very cool and very responsible. A great combination for any kid to aspire to!<\/p>\n
I loved the playground because it was filled with neighborhood kids ready to play kickball, softball, volleyball, and practice for the upcoming Romper Day. Romper Day was the Super Bowl of the playground world. On that glorious day, The Allentown Fairgrounds was packed with the excitement of literally hundreds of young people from playgrounds all across the city. My world was pretty small back then and competing and engaging with young people from parts unknown was everything I loved about summer.<\/p>\n
To top it all off, after a day of fun in the sun, every participant got a free hotdog and popsicle. To me, standing in line at Agricultural Hall to receive my free lunch was a dream come true. Forever etched in my mind was that delicious food, which would be today\u2019s version of a three-course meal at Melt. I devoured every bite because as a 10-year-old from a family of seven kids, hot dogs and popsicles were hard to come by. Oh, I would occasionally get a peek of them in our refrigerator, and then they were devoured by my big brothers before I knew it.<\/p>\n
Back to the wonders of summer. Musikfest. To me, that\u2019s the epitome of Lehigh Valley summer entertainment. It never ceases to amaze me how alive the City of Bethlehem becomes. From City Hall to the South Side of Bethlehem, all you hear is music and, all you see are thousands of happy people what we like to call, festing.<\/p>\n
Our incredible festival brings people from all across the country. And when you arrive in downtown Bethlehem you can\u2019t help but feel anything but happy and proud of what was created by local leaders. People like Jeff Parks, who had an amazing vision, and now Kassie Hilgert who is committed to making it even better every year. I would be totally remiss if I didn\u2019t mention the thousands of volunteers devoted to making Musikfest the No. 1 festival. Thank you to all the caring people who commit of your time for the love of the community.<\/p>\n
As I drove to Musikfest that night, I passed by Macungie Park, where I had been a few days earlier for the Das Awkscht Fest. For me, seeing hundreds of cars from the \u201960s and \u201970s brings back amazing memories. It was fashionable in most cities to have a loop where young people would show off their gorgeous prize possessions \u2014 driving the strip. In Allentown, it was down Hamilton Street to show off your freshly waxed, shiny car and then up Linden to make the continuous loop. Can you imagine today literally hundreds of cars up and down the streets, racing their powerful engines to impress. We considered it a wonderful rite of passage, and the adults considered it nothing more than a nuisance.<\/p>\n
I remember distinctly as a boy there was a gorgeous yellow Chevelle SS with chrome wheels. It would show up around town in the evening and glide by me almost like a gorgeous animal you occasionally catch a glimpse of running through the woods. As a 13-year-old I would look at that car and dream someday I would sit behind the wheel of something that beautiful. Maybe it was my first realization that beautiful things motivate you to work hard to obtain them, and that\u2019s a good thing.<\/p>\n
As I drove past the fairgrounds, my mind drifted to how much fun I had over the years at The Great Allentown Fair. The incredible smells of the food that filled the Fairway, the blaring noise of the barkers trying to entice people into their various shows, and the games of chance. For me, it was the candy wheel. I couldn\u2019t get enough of Reese\u2018s peanut butter cups, and I was willing to put a nickel down for a chance to devour one of those delicious treats. It was all so safe, so fun, and so Lehigh Valley.<\/p>\n
As I continued my trek to Musikfest I passed by the Boulevard Drive-In. It\u2019s not a drive-in anymore, but the huge screen is still there. I remembered so many times passing by Union Boulevard and seeing a movie on that huge screen for a fleeting moment as I passed by. I knew there were lots of happy people being entertained on a warm\u00a0summer\u2019s night. Drive-ins to me as a kid were heaven on earth. All the cars lined the rows in anticipation of the movie, and the big, old-school speaker blaring with sound hanging from the window. The happiness that drive-ins brought is almost indescribable.<\/p>\n
It was summer, it was warm, the windows were down and you were happy.<\/p>\n
Today there are so many avenues of entertainment, with so many focused on virtual reality. But there\u2019s no reality better than being surrounded by tons of happy humans. Crowds of hustling people, smiling and enjoying life together.<\/p>\n
So, here\u2019s to all the dreamers. The people who either created a dream or just won\u2019t let it go. That for the good of the community, they create happiness. After all, their goal was to bring people together, to share happiness, and build a successful event.<\/p>\n
Thank you again, Jeff Parks and his group of dreamers, for creating the wonders of Musikfest, and thank you today to Kassie Hilgert for keeping that dream so successfully alive and even better every year. And thank you, Beverly Gruber, for insisting that the incredible memories of the Allentown Fair will be passed on to the next generation. And a big thank you to Phil Kresge, even though Das Awkscht Fest started in the \u201860s, it\u2019s not going to die, but be better under his watch.<\/p>\n
Yes, the economic success of a region is important, but equally as much and maybe more, is the quality of life. Thankfully, in this region, we have so many people who are dedicated to maintaining our incredible quality of life. Whether it\u2019s Kurt Landes and his dedication to the IronPigs, or Rob and Jim Brooks who bring us the excitement of Phantoms hockey, and now professional indoor soccer. All working hard on quality of life and to pass on something beautiful to the generation behind us and to make sure that our children have the same happiness that we enjoyed.<\/p>\n
And here\u2019s to all your hard-working Lehigh Valley types \u2014 the families who worked hard for generations during the industrial revolution to build what we enjoy today. We are definitely hard workers, but in all that work, we haven\u2019t forgotten how to have fun. We haven\u2019t forgotten that quality of life, in the end is the payoff for all our hard work.<\/p>\n
I know somewhere today there\u2019s a young person who perhaps unknowingly will dream of something that will celebrate his or her community and bring happiness to thousands. Because the math is pretty simple. Hard work is the main ingredient, but by mixing in a couple of dreamers, a couple of visionaries, you can get what we have today. A pretty darn successful community! But in typical Lehigh Valley style, we agree, yeah it\u2019s pretty darn successful, but there\u2019s more work to be done. Because you can\u2019t stop workers from working and having a little bit of fun in between.<\/p>\n
This is a contributed opinion column. Tony Iannelli is the president and CEO of the Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce. He can be reached at tonyi@lehighvalleychamber.org..<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I\u2019ve been very clear about my love for one season, and that is summer. Besides the fact that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":260970,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[153,155,154,60,182,139,432],"class_list":["post-260969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem","tag-bethlehem-headlines","tag-bethlehem-news","tag-business","tag-local-news","tag-news","tag-top-stories-tmc"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=260969"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/260969\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/260970"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=260969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=260969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=260969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}