Boulder City - The Magazine is a monthly publication full of information about Boulder City and Southern Nevada. Boulder City - The Magazine features the Boulder City Home Guide, a real estate guide to Boulder City and Southern Nevada.

Cover Story

Boulder City Damboree 2004
by Ev Chase

Four years ago I wrote the following words on page 22 of the Boulder City Home Guide, the forerunner of Boulder City, The Magazine. Nothing has been changed in the first paragraph which is restated below except the number of years involved and my feelings about the subject, which in light of current events are even stronger now then they were in the year 2000. In the year 2000 our most important and pressing problem appeared to be - you remember - a computer glitch.

A secure future is built on solid foundations of the past. Boulder City continues to renew its legacy - those solid foundations - with ideals and activities such as the annual 4th of July Damboree. The Boulder Damboree is an Independence Day celebration that has continued, uninterrupted, for the past 55 years.

When you read the passage above, you will have already witnessed another Independence Day in which the United States armed forces have fought and died - the freedom and independence of Iraq.

Certainly more important than the computer glitch of 2000, which was billed as if the destruction of the world would be dumped upon us, the people of Iraq, the United States, and the rest of the world, will have to wait for history to decide if there is still such a thing as independence.

Boulder City itself, has always expressed special feelings for its veterans, particularly during our Damboree celebration.

Boulder City was a city born as the caldron of Fascism began to boil in Europe. Our Veterans cemetery has become the resting place for many of those who died in that war to end all wars and the resting place for those who followed because it didn't.

Things have changed and there is no longer a draft, but I am proud to say three generations of my family (beginning with my father born in 1902 and continuing with my youngest son, who is still in the National Guard) served in the United States Armed Forces.

Although there are as many different reasons why men and women join the service, as there are those who do it, they all make the commitment to serve their country.

A commitment to serve our country, dates back in colonial times before the day we celebrate - Independence Day.

Less glamorous, I'm sure, than the stories about "The Red Coats are coming, The Red Coats are coming" and Washington crossing the Delaware, the real thing we experience through the miracle of television provides an outlook on war which should make us all shiver - and remember.

Although our town is far from the place of our countries beginnings, remembering how our country began, the hardships of war itself, the many reasons for the shedding of blood among friends and relatives, when friends and relatives were on opposing sides, we must celebrate to know that it all was necessary to gain freedom.

Freedom is the point of the Boulder City Damboree; to celebrate the efforts of our sons and daughters, friends and relatives, and our ancestors, who have fought and died, whether on American soil, as many did in the past, or who are fighting now in Iraq and other foreign countries.

In Boulder City, we celebrate with a parade of patriotic origin and thoughts, of course, but also with floats, cars, bands, and just people expressing themselves in the freedom which we continue to fight to protect.




Boulder City - The Magazine®
688 Wells Rd #A
Boulder City, Nevada 89005
(702) 293-4916 or (702) 294-1392
E-mail: BoulderCityMagazine@gmail.com



Web Site Design by Appleby Arts
Copyright © 2004 - Boulder City-The Magazine - All Rights Reserved
E-mail Web Master at: webmaster@bouldercitymagazine.com

Disclaimer