THE SPECTATORS LINED up early on Saturday. They snuggled in along Main Street across from Civic Center Park, some with folding camp chairs, a few dressed in red, white and blue attire, all eager to catch a glimpse of the passing parade.
A parade in Oakley? Folks here haven’t seen the like since the days of the Almond Festival, and that’s been more than a dozen years ago. But it’s easy to get a little nostalgic when you’re celebrating a milestone birthday.
Oakley turns 25 years old this year, and while there may be some disagreement as to when it was actually founded back in the 1890s, there is no doubt as to the day it incorporated with the passage of Measure O that established the City of Oakley on July 1, 1999.
Pat Anderson served on the original City Council and holds the distinction of having been the city’s first mayor. On Saturday, she rode along the parade route in style in a white, horse-drawn carriage, seated beside current Mayor Anissa Williams and waving to the crowd.
They were followed by dance groups, Scouting troops, soccer clubs and classic cars — at least a dozen lowriders souped up with gleaming chrome and steel, egged on by emcee Greg Robinson to show off their hydraulic lift kits for the appreciative crowd. Sirens blared, politicians preened, mounted equestrians trotted by. Kids passed out candies and T-shirts and tossed waves in their colorful costumes from the back of flatbed trailers. Just like old times.
They all took their turn in front of the review stand at the corner of Norcross Lane, dancing, twirling and performing for the judges beneath blue-and-white banners hung from the lamp posts: “25 YEARS – 1999-2024 – OAKLEY, CALIFORNIA”
My, how you’ve grown
The city’s come a long way since those early years. Gone are the vacant lots, rutted pavement and tired buildings that once dominated the downtown landscape. In their place, a modern City Hall and shopping plaza surrounded by a sprawling park and amphitheater where on Saturday craft and food vendors set up shop for the annual Summerfest.
The event is cozier than in years past when it took place at the Freedom High School park basin and included a nighttime fireworks display. The fireworks stopped during the pandemic when things started to get rowdy, replaced by what organizers now bill as a “family-friendly festival” closing no later than 4 p.m. Well, you know how it is when you grow older, you just don’t party all night like you did in your crazy teenage days.
That doesn’t mean you can’t still show off your best moves every now and then, and folks did just that with the help of carnival rides and local blues band Delta OG, which provided the day’s entertainment beneath the bandstand.
And meanwhile, a few dozen yards to the north of where the festivities were happening, heavy machinery idled under the midday sun at a construction site behind the Grocery Outlet store. Laying down asphalt and more parking stalls for the next big project: an Amtrak train station. A promised future as exciting as when the Santa Fe first dropped iron in this dusty Delta town 120 years ago.
Yes, Oakley’s aged pretty well in its first 25 years as a real city. One can only imagine where she’ll be at 50.
The post Oakley parties like it’s 1999: Town celebrates 25 years of cityhood with parade and festival appeared first on Local News Matters.