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Alumni line streets as ISU homecoming parade marches on

By Phyllis Coulter
pcoulter@pantagraph.com

NORMAL — Don and Bev Swanlund of Normal lined up Saturday with thousands of people eager to watch Illinois State University’s homecoming parade — a highlight of the university’s yearlong celebration of its 150th anniversary. | Homecoming photo gallery

For Don Swanlund, the year has special significance because he graduated from college in 1957. In honor of the occasion, he wore a red ISU T-shirt emblazoned with the year he graduated — from the University of Illinois.

He didn’t go to ISU, and neither did his wife or their children.

“We’re just ISU fans,” Don Swanlund said.

The couple, who has lived in Normal for 41 years, regularly attends ISU basketball and football games.

“I think it (ISU) is a driving force for our community,” said Don Swanlund, a Growmark Inc. retiree and active volunteer in the community. He said values both the interaction with students and the fact that the school is a large employer here.

“It represents vitality and different cultures,” he said.

Founded in 1857 as Illinois State Normal University, ISU gave the town of Normal its name and much of its identity. On Saturday, alumni from near and far, students and “townies” rubbed shoulders to celebrate that heritage during the one-hour, 45-minute parade which fittingly had 150 entries.

Leading the parade through campus and the heart of Normal were cars full of 1957 graduates who experienced the school’s centennial celebrations.

They were followed closely by the 33rd Illinois Volunteer Regiment Band, which honors the Civil War “teachers’ regiment” led by ISNU’s first president, Charles Hovey. Also among the nine bands in the parade was ISU’s own Big Red Marching Machine.

Enid Cardinal, who recently moved from New York to the Twin Cities to work for the university, had a front-row seat.

As the school’s sustainability coordinator, she thought it would be a good idea to award a prize for a parade float that offered the most environmentally positive message. That category wasn’t added to the parade competition this year, but she was invited to be a judge.

“Maybe next year,” she said.

Finding love at Illinois State

Like many couples watching the parade, Stephen and Carolyn Brown of Mahomet, who gradated in 1972 and 1973 respectively, met at the university. They met at International House and lived in Fell Hall, the first co-ed living quarters on campus.

They enjoyed chatting about how things have changed since they lived in the building, which now houses academic offices and classrooms.

“Her former room is a stairway now, and mine is a custodial closet,” said Brown, who is a communications professor at Parkland College in Champaign.

John and Nancy Wolter of Normal also marveled at how the campus has changed in the nearly 50 years since they were on students. Wolter, a 1958 graduate, who wore his original football letterman jacket, recalls being quarterback on McCormick Field, which is now a parking lot.

“Everything has grown so much,” said Jane Koenig, of Crown Point, Ind., a 1984 ISU graduate who watched the parade with her family, including stepdaughter Kristi Vurpillat, an ISU freshman.

Vurpillat said homecoming is a great time to be a student on campus.

“It makes the campus a lot more fun with all the decorations and encourages school spirit,” she said.

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Homecoming king Tom Ponce and queen Kay Uy wave Saturday (Oct. 13, 2007) during the homecoming parade on College Ave in Normal. (Pantagraph/CARLOS T. MIRANDA)

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