- December 25, 2024
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The stage at Rockefeller Gardens is decorated for the Fourth of July. Photo by Jarleene Almenas
A banner over West Granada Boulevard advertises the city's Independence Day Celebration. Photo by Jarleene Almenas
A banner over West Granada Boulevard advertises the city's Independence Day Celebration. Photo by Jarleene Almenas
Stars and stripes adorn the outside of The Casements for the Fourth of July. Photo by Jarleene Almenas
A fireworks show over the Granada Bridge is a longstanding Ormond Beach Fourth of July tradition. Photo by Jarleene Almenas
On Thursday, July 4, the United States will celebrate its 248th anniversary of independence — and in the city of Ormond Beach, the holiday will be celebrated with music, food and fireworks.
Just as it has been for decades upon decades.
“It’s always a great summer holiday in Ormond Beach — a time to celebrate our nation’s independence and spend time with family and then honor and remember the folks who keep us safe and sacrifice so that we can enjoy the freedoms that we do,” Mayor Bill Partington said.
This year’s celebration will be his last as the city’s mayor. It’s a bittersweet feeling, he said, as it’s one of his favorite holidays.
“Seeing the whole city gathered together and all as Americans celebrating what really is a great national holiday is a special thing for a mayor to witness that,” Partington said.
The city’s annual Independence Day Celebration will begin at 8 p.m. at Rockefeller Gardens, located at 26 Riverside Drive. The firework show, presented by Fireworks by Santore, will begin at 9 p.m.
Though the celebrations have been scaled back in recent years, the city has celebrated the Fourth of July this way since 1999.
But what were celebrations like before then?
Before Ormond Beach’s current City Hall was constructed, there used to be a big corn boil event on the property every Fourth of July.
Longtime resident Bill Partington Sr., the mayor’s father, remembers different civic groups would organize it year after year, and the event would include dunk tanks and barbecue.
The city’s firefighters, he recalled, would do an annual fish fry at the city’s old lifeguard station (this was in the 1970s, before the county took over the beach’s management).
“They would bring their equipment that they used in the fish fry and the Rotary Club (of Ormond Beach) would use that for the corn boil,” Partington Sr. said. “They had big baskets that were like 18 inches squared and they would dip them down into the boiling water to cook the corn and dip them in butter. Everybody remembers the corn boil. It was fun.”
Mayor Partington remembers cookouts and family get-togethers were the norm for Fourth of July celebrations back then. But, everybody knew to head down to the Granada Bridge for fireworks.
“I can probably remember back over 50 years – just over 50 years — and it seems like there was always something going on,” Partington said.
And then came Ormond Beach’s Jazz Matazz.
John Connors moved to Ormond Beach in 1969. Having grown up in the area, there was always something to do in town on the Fourth of July.
In 1988, when he was the executive director of the Ormond Beach Chamber of Commerce, Connors said the city and the chamber began a conversation about wanting to host a special event for the following Fourth of July. They came up with the idea of holding a jazz festival.
“And of course, we didn’t want to call it the Ormond Beach Jazz Festival, we wanted something more unique,” Connors said.
The chamber brought on longtime local entertainer Tom Cellie to help produce the festival and Jazz Matazz was born. The idea was to celebrate music, food and people, Connors said.
The first Jazz Matazz was held in 1989 with a budget of $2,000. By the time the last festival was held in 1997, it cost the chamber about a quarter million dollars to put it on, Connors said.
“We had 17 committees we created and everybody had something else to do, and it was a big job,” he said. “You know, 100-150 volunteers working on it for months.”
Partington used to work security at the event when he was in his upperclassman days at Mainland High and early college years. His dad was also involved in putting it on.
“I would be hired for like 8 bucks an hour or something to keep an eye on the grounds late into the night,” Partington recalled.
The two-day festival certainly drew a lot of great entertainment to the area: Spyro Gyra, Herbie Mann, Chuck Mangione, Béla Fleck and the Flecktones, and Brian Culberton to name a few. Storyteller Gamble Rogers performed in the first Jazz Matazz as well.
“As it got bigger and bigger, it got riskier and riskier,” Connors said with a laugh.
The festival was never intended to make money, Connors said. They rarely made more than a few thousand dollars every year, and as the years went on, that got scarier for both the city and the chamber.
Ormond Beach resident Jeff Boyle was a city commissioner in the later years of Jazz Matazz. As a big jazz fan, he attended the event. People came from all over, he said — including the State Rep. at the time, John Mica.
“It was a very popular event and I think it helped define the wonderful culture we have of Ormond Beach,” Boyle said.
Jazz Matazz was Connor’s baby, Partington Sr. said. But weather was always a challenge. The festival took place prior to the city raising Rockefeller Gardens’ elevation up by 4 feet, so the park flooded when it rained.
All of the contracts for Jazz Matazz were “rain or shine.”
“We just couldn’t go on in the rain, but we had to pay the entertainers anyway,” Partington Sr. said. “So you bring in Spyro Gyra or Al Hirt or somebody like that ... a big name and you’re paying them at that time, $25,000 to come to Ormond Beach.”
It always rains in July, Connors said, and rainout insurance was a big cost, which the city helped with. The chamber couldn’t have done it alone, because a rainout on a day with the biggest acts would have rendered the chamber broke. Hence, why they were careful, Connors said.
About 40,000 people were attending the festival every year at one point. So the biggest thing for the chamber, risk aside, was giving something back to the community.
That brought Connors a lot of happiness, he said.
“I can’t tell you the happiness that it brings in my thought process every time I turn around,” Connors said. “I keep some of the posters up on my walls here at the house that just bring back good memories.”
Jazz Matazz was the foundation for today’s Independence Day Celebration in the city.
In 1999, the city hosted its “Four Corners” celebration — using all four corner bridge parks to celebrate the Fourth of July, according to an article from the Orlando Sentinel. There was music, food, a moonwalk, relay races, human foosball and “larger-than-life” Twister.
“What [the city] basically did is they created something that replaced it that they could manage, and they manage it well,” Connors said. “The fireworks are always the cherry on top.”
It’s all to bring families together to celebrate summer and Independence Day.
When Jazz Matazz and the corn boils were taking place in town, Ormond’s population hovered around 15,000 to 20,000 people, Partington Sr. said.
“It was a much smaller community then, but all those things are great memories,” he said.
If the city’s festivities were to continue to evolve, he said he would love for Central Park to be incorporated.
To kick off the city’s fireworks, the mayor and commissioners “detonate” a faux TNT box, a tradition Partington said likely began sometime within the last decade. He’s looking forward to that too.
“It’s been a popular addition ever since,” Partington said. “That’s just a fun way to kick off the fireworks.”
