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Parade marshals share passion for maple
(by Joseph Koziol Jr. - April 28, 2011)
Parade marshals share passion for maple
By JOSEPH KOZIOL JR.
One found it early in life, while the other got it a little later.
But, both of this year's parade marshals for Geauga County Maple Festival parades at 3 p.m. Saturday and Sunday share a passion today for the sweet stuff that the county celebrates each year.
On Saturday, Bill Ward, a lifelong resident of the county, takes the lead on the annual parade that is billed as "The Secret Ingredient -- Maple."
Sunday, leading the parade will be someone who knows a thing or two about ingredients, Loretta Paganini, founder of the School of Cooking in Chester Township.
Mr. Ward, who said he has spent 40 years behind a camera or in front of a microphone in radio and television, calls the chance to lead the parade a "great capper to my career."
Since he was a school boy, he said, he has known the excitement that maple season brings each spring. "You knew spring was here when you saw steam rising from the woods," Mr. Ward said.
He said he remembered eagerly jumping off the school bus and rushing into his home to change into boots and jeans before making his way into the woods where the sugar house was in full operation. There, he said, he would spend the evening enjoying the company and stories of the farmers who kept one of the county's richest traditions alive.
Those days were spent with a neighbor farmer, who worked the sugar maples on Mr. Ward's family property and brought the sap to the sugar house using a team of horses, he said.
Since then, Mr. Ward said, he has long harbored a desire to establish his own sugar bush. He said he needs it to "support his habit."
But, even if he can't make his own at this juncture, he can still enjoy the fruits of others.
Each winter, on Sunday mornings, he prepares for his family a "farm breakfast." That hearty meal includes waffles, scrambled eggs and bacon. The meal would be incomplete, he said, without locally produced maple syrup.
And, when the breakfasts come to an end around April, he said, he stashes away a couple gallons of the sweet stuff because they make great Christmas gifts.
While serving as parade marshal will be a first, he said, he has long been involved entering and winning the photo contests there. Being a purist, he said, he has always entered the "maple" category.
For Mrs. Paganini, maple is a "wonderful prize" that Geauga County offers to its residents and those in the cooking arts.
While most customers seek out the lighter-colored syrup, Mrs. Paganini said it is the darker syrup, richer in flavor, that suits those with a taste for the culinary arts. She said she uses it frequently in her own dishes and features it at her cooking school to allow students to become aware of the flavorful enhancements it offers.
Mrs. Paganini, who was born in Bologna, Italy, a city the size of Cleveland, considers herself a "city girl" who learned of the maple traditions in Geauga later in life. After moving from Italy to New York City, she said, she eventually found herself in Shaker Heights. In 1985, she said, she moved to the "back 40," a 40-acre property in Geauga County.
The city girl upbringing did not prepare her for the culture shock of country living, so she was a little confused when she took a pleasure walk on those 40 acres.
On that walk, she said, she began noticing all the buckets hanging on trees and brick fire pits spread around the area. She asked a neighbor, "Why do they barbecue all the way out here?"
The neighbor set her straight on the Geauga tradition.
Mrs. Paganini said she looks forward to serving as parade marshal at a festival that brings back childhood memories of the street festivals in her native Bologna.
She said it is a time for renewal with nature and the county's population as well as people begin coming out of hibernation from the winter.
At this year's parade, she will be joined by her 1 1/2-year-old granddaughter, who returned this year with her daughter.
The maple festival is one essential element for life in Geauga County, she said.
"Life would not be the same without the maple festival and the county fair," she said. "It's part of the tradition."
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