LETTER: Save the Corn Palace Festival from last rites

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To the Editor:

The passing of a beautiful event in our generation has been given its last rites. We received notice that this wonderful event that has been with us for 31 years is passing on. For 31 years, thousands upon thousands of people have enjoyed this event and no matter how hard people have helped to revise this great event over the last several months, this beautiful event may not be back on our schedule.

I am writing about the death of the great and wonderful Corn Palace Polka Festival in Mitchell, which is held each year during the month of September.

The festival has brought people from all around our country. They have brought our musical heritage along with them and displayed it with their musical talents on the dance floor of the Corn Palace. The last year we attended the festival, which was 2010, Mark Schilling told me they had peoples from 48 states.

Some of the highlights of the festival were the polka mass and worship services, which were held each Sunday along with the parade of flags.

We are the ambassadors for the Arizona Chapter of the Po.l.k. Of A Klub, and our club is putting its full support behind having the Corn Palace Polka Festival reinstated. Our members come from many parts of the United States and come to Arizona for the winter months. This past winter our club had 22 dances from November to March. Many of our members feel that Mitchell Corn Palace was one of first and finest polka festival around.

We hope that this festival can be reinstated; this is the Granddaddy Polka Dance Festival of them all.

I hope this will not be an obituary for our beloved Corn Palace Polka Fest.

Tags: corn palace, opinion, letters, updates, polka