George Wallace

George Bonfiglio of the 27th Lancers - no question. When the IC Reveries disbanded after the 1966 season, George had been one of the Corp Directors. The kids met at George's house and wanted to keep something going. George went out and took out a seconf mortgage on his home to get the initial funding to start a corp that didn't even have a name. It was when watching the old movie "Charge of the Light Brigade' on TV, the unit that mead the charge was The 27th Lancers, and the corp had a name. They used borrowed West pPoint uniforms for the first parade and the corp was always broke and in debt. We sold eggs to raise money in 1971 (my first year), and all the members purchased their own weekly allotment. I don't know of anyone who actually sold them. In 1972, it was Best Line Soap - I don't remember what happened with that, and each member was given 7 $1.00 chances to sell every week - we all bought our own. We never had any money. When we went on our summer tours, everything had to fit on the 3 buses. Personal luggage, equipment, uniforms and people. All of it was on 3 buses that had a multitude of mechanical issues, no bathrooms, and at least one of them didn't have air conditioning. I am not sure about this, but I doubt we ever actually paid our bus drivers! If we did, it wasn't very much. I don't know when the Lancers got an equipment truck, but I aged out in 1975 and it was still a few years off. George was also a key figure in the birth of DCI. In fact, George was the first President of DCI. George Bonfiglio started the Lancers from nothing and built one of the most popular and respected Drum and Bugle Corps in the history of the activity. He faced some kind of adversity every day that would have crumbled a lesser man. And I never once heard him complain. George Wallace 27th Lancers 1971 to 1975