Warden Community Days attracts crowd

WARDEN - Several people visited Warden Monday for the city's Community Days Celebration.

This annual event, held on Labor Day, regularly draws spectators from near and far, as the city's event featured a parade and a celebration at Volunteer Park.

"Even though we live in Ellensburg, we always make it a point to come out to Community Days. It just has a great small town atmosphere, which is rare to find," Gloria Roberts said.

The day started with firefighters from Grant County Fire District No. 4 hosting their regular pancake breakfast at Volunteer Park.

The parade portion of the day kicked off at 11 a.m., but people started crowding the sidewalks of Main Street and Ash Street an hour early just to get a good glimpse of the parade entries.

Warden's mayor, Tony Massa, was helping on the loud speaker, identifying the parade entries for the crowd.

The parade featured political candidates, the Warden High School band, Warden High School cheerleaders, classic cars and trucks and numerous horses and donkeys.

"We come out every year mainly for our kids. They are 7 and 3 and love grabbing as much candy as they possibly can," David Adams, of Moses Lake, said.

As the parade ended, and children's bags full of candy started to burst at the seams, on-goers started to make their way to Volunteer Park.

The celebration at Volunteer Park featured numerous booths, games and food selections.

Activities included a horseshoe tournament, a three-on-three basketball tournament, a volleyball tournament, a fireman's water barrel competition, and Warden's Future Farmers of America "rent a farmer auction."

"There really is no better way to spend your Labor Day than coming down here to Volunteer Park and taking in all of the events. There is so much to do, and you have to try hard to be bored at an event like this," Claire Holmes, of Moses Lake, said.

The celebration in the park also featured classes from Warden High School hosting fundraising events.

The class of 2017 offered a "car whack" event, at which a person could donate for the opportunity to take either a sledgehammer or a baseball bat and whack a car as hard as they could.

The class of 2018 hosted a face-painting booth for children.