Alumni activities, car show part of weekend's Glory Days activity

Every Memorial Day week­end, high school alumni from Holton and the surrounding area get to­gether for their annual celebration of their “glory days” — and all of northeastern Kan­sas is invited to join in the fun.

The annual Glory Days cele­bra­tion is set to take over Holton’s Town Square with craft and food displays, classic and antique vehicles and an alumni parade. The event has also been ex­panded this year to include a Holton Community Hospital Health Fair (see related article) and will culmi­nate with the annual alumni ban­quet and “after-party,” it was re­ported.

Glory Days activities will kick off the Memorial Day and alumni weekend with the Holton Lions Club’s annual fund-rais­ing ham­burger feed from 5 p.m. to 7 p.m. Friday on the Jackson County Courtyard. The Lions will sell bur­gers, chips and soda for $5 a plate. Starting at 5:30 p.m., Gary Bell and Friends will provide a free concert at the courtyard gazebo, and those attending are encouraged to bring lawn chairs.

On Saturday morning, Glory Days activities on the Square start with craft and food booths on the Courtyard, where Beth McManigal of the Holton/Jackson County Chamber of Commerce said more than 30 vendors will offer a wide variety of items for sale. Vendors are expected to be active between 8:30 a.m. and 3 p.m., it was re­ported.

Car, truck and motorcycle enthu­siasts are also invited to the Square to participate in the annual Glory Days Antique and Hot Rod Car Show, where vehicles of various shapes, sizes, makes models and years will take over Fifth Street (the north side of the Square). Prizes will be given to the best ve­hicles in various categories starting at 1:30 p.m., it was reported.

There’s also the alumni parade, which begins at 11 a.m. around Holton’s Town Square and is once again open to all celebrating classes from any Jackson County school, past and present, whether it’s Holton, Royal Valley or Jackson Heights, or now-defunct schools in the county’s smaller towns. The parade will line up at the HHS east parking lot at 10:30 a.m. that day.

Off the Square, there will be a garden tractor pull at the former Jackson County Fairgrounds site (north of the new Casey’s General Store) on U.S. Highway 75. Garden tractors are invited to weigh in starting at 10 a.m. for an 11 a.m. kick-off; contact Charles Call at 364-2336 for more information or to register.

That evening, Holton High School graduates will get together again for the annual alumni ban­quet at the high school, starting with a social hour from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. in the upper commons area, followed by a dinner catered by Trails Café and Café Catering of Holton.

This year, the keynote speaker will be Dr. Jordan Brandt, a 1996 HHS graduate who has made a name for himself in the world of technology. After re­ceiving a Ph.D. in building tech­nology from Har­vard University in 2008, he and a classmate started Horizontal Sys­tems, a New York-based firm that created one of the first cloud-based applications for computing and modeling building design.

Leading technology firm Autodesk bought Horizontal Sys­tems in 2011, and Brandt stayed with Autodesk until last year, when he became the president, CEO and director of Inpher, a San Francisco-based tech security firm. Brandt was also named one of Forbes Magazine’s 12 “NextGen Innova­tors” in 2014.

The Alumnus of the Year hon­oree for 2016 will also be an­nounced during the banquet, it was reported. A feature interview with the honoree is scheduled to appear in the Wednesday, June 1 edition of The Holton Recorder.

There will also be an after-party event at St. Dominic Parish Hall from 9 p.m. to midnight with live music by the Micah Halton Band, featuring HHS alumni, and a beer garden for graduates age 21 and older, she said. The event is in­cluded in the cost of the banquet ticket, or $5 at the door, it was re­ported.

Tickets for the annual banquet are $25 per person and may be pur­chased at any Holton area bank. More information on tickets and the banquet may be obtained by calling Kim Mitchell at (785) 410-5391 or by e-mailing holtonalumni@gmail.com

Jackson County high school alumni are also invited to share their class reunion plans for the coming weekend. Please call The Recorder or e-mail information to holtonrecorder@giantcomm.net by 5 p.m. Tuesday for inclusion in Wednesday’s Recorder, which will include the annual Glory Days sec­tion, this year spotlighting the Class of 1966.

Also, all classes gathering for reunions are encouraged to e-mail a group photo of the class to The Recorder at the above address.