Archive: Around Town

The Community Fireworks Committee announces that the 64th annual show will be held Friday night, July 1, on the campus of Tompkins Cortland Community College in Dryden.

“This is the second year that TC3 has hosted the event, and we couldn’t be more grateful to the community college for stepping up once again to help us carry on this patriotic tradition,” said Fran Benedict, chair of the volunteer committee that has organized the annual shows.  “It was a great show last year, enjoyed by thousands who came from all over central New York and from as far away as northern Pennsylvania.  We hope this year’s show will be even better.”

Benedict also said that he and fellow committee members Rudy Paolangeli and David Stewart will be retiring from the committee this year.  The annual shows began in 1947, and the trio has been involved in organizing the annual shows for a combined 125 years.

Benedict, Paolangeli, and Stewart praised TC3 for hosting the 2010 show and thanked Cornell University and Ithaca College for serving as host sites for the previous 63 shows and related activities. 

“TC3 is pleased to help the committee with its most important goal — continuing the tradition of annual fireworks shows to kick off the local observance of the Independence Holiday,” Carl Haynes, president of Tompkins Cortland Community College.

This will be the second year the show will be at TC3, but it should be the last year at the Dryden campus. A new group of Ithaca community members is working to bring the show back to its roots for 2012.

Donations from area residents and visitors continue to be the mainstay of support for the fireworks shows, Benedict said.  “Putting on such shows is costly, and community support through donations will be no exception this year.”

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