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2 more Prelims shots:

More '85 Prelims

Madison Prelims, 1985. Opening Set: Dad didn't have a panoramic camera, so he just created his own panoramic shots.

Giants Stadium, 1985:

Garfield Cadets, 1985 - Giants Stadium:

Madison, 1985:

One last shot from '84: Dress Up Day (I choose to call it Dress Up Day because what we actually called it back then might be perceived as less-than politically correct). Many of you may recognize the Fashion Plate on the left as none other than April Gilligan:

Bloomfield, NJ, 1984. This was a good night for us, because we were able to debut our Brand New Plumes:

A couple more from Giants Stadium. These are significant to me because my sister, Kathy, & I marched together for 11 seasons, and this was the only time we were ever staged side-by-side in all of our years together. Dad loved the end of "America", because it was the one time he could get 2 "kid shots" in one frame!

Giants Stadium, 1984:

And now, a mess of Garfield shots from 1984. I'd be remiss if I didn't start with a shot of our "brand new" buses: Aren't they spectacular? They came equipped with what I liked to call the Audience Appreciation Feature, where they would arbitrarily stop on the side of the road, usually on a daily basis, allowing passers-by to bask in their magnificence! As you can see in this picture, the AAF has once again been deployed.

Some random shots from 1984: Ventures Cavaliers Crossmen Bridgemen

DCI Championship Ithaca, NY Prelims August 16th Open class had 57 corps, top score 87.75, lowest 22.80 A nearly 65-point spread from 1st to last................YIKES!!! My corps was 47-pointed by the Blue Devils in 1982, but I can imagine what getting 65-pointed must've felt like!! Again, I say.....YIKES!!!!!!

Ah, yes....Whitewater '84.....one of the now-legendary tales in This Thing Of Ours...... Being on the field that night was rather interesting. No, I wasn't one of the "dominoes", but it (literally) happened right behind me. It was a blind backup at a 2-step interval at 190-ish. One of the sops let the guy in front of him get too close, and those that were there know the rest. I didn't see the mayhem ensue, but marched right past the pile of bodies - about 8 of them. At that moment, I had absolutely no idea what was happening, but what I can remember is seeing Donnie & Shorty side-by-side on the track "givin' it up" (a pretty good show up to that point), and then suddenly simultaneously putting hands to face (what I always called the "Home Alone Gesture"), and then sprinting down the track in the direction of the crash. That's when I was able to see what had happened out of the corner of my eye. I've only ever seen one photo of the crash, and it was pretty horrifying...one of our sops in midair, arms & legs stretched directly out in front of him, almost as though he was sitting on a recliner. The one positive thing that did come from that was that, for the rest of the season, we would set up a 2X2 block & march backward at 190-ish as part of our visual block every day. Everybody learned how to march a blind backup at a 2-step interval, suffice it to say!!

My first year in Garfield ('83), I was 16. My son marched his first year with Surf when he was 12, and stayed for 8 of the 10 years he was eligible to march.

What's this? A "time machine" thread where one doesn't have to feel ashamed about being a little self-indulgent? Ok, I'll play! Family portrait in the front yard in anticipation of Baby's First Public Performance: July 2, 1976: (For the record...I'm the little one.) 9 years old, about to march my first parade...Christmas morning-type excited (obviously before participating in an additional 10,476 parades and learning to feel about as good about a parade as one typically feels about a trip to the dentist!) To shed a little light on just how little I was when I was 9 (as if the fact that my Sop took up 3/4 of my body)...for those that might know me, particularly from my Garfield days, you probably also know my big sister, Kathy. For those that don't, Kathy was the TEENY TINY mellophone in Garfield in 1983-84-85. Here's what we looked like in our later days: 1984: End of "America". The only time in the 11 years we marched together that we were ever side-by-side. Dad loved that part of the show, because it was the one time he could get us both in 1 shot! So as you can see, I got taller. Kathy? Not so much. Once again hitting the rewind button on the Way Back Machine...here I am in Baby's First Public Performance: Only 9 years old, but had obviously been practicing my game face in the mirror :) And now....fast forward 11 years: And, just for giggles, 5 more: 1992 DCA finals with Reading. Thus endeth the self-indulgence.....thank you for your patience!

If there was discussion, I was never a part of it. I started marching with IK when I was 9, so the likelihood would've been to steer me away from it. To be honest, I never even knew that a former member had been murdered. That's certainly not something you ever want to hear.

Imperial Knights - Midland Park, NJ. World Open Class B Prelims - July 29, 1977. 43.85 - 25th place Not only was this my first show, it was the first field show that the corps had done since the early '60s. Prior to my jointing IK in 1976, the corps had been an all-girl drum & bell corps that primarily did parades & standstill (not sure when they started admitting guys, not sure when they added brass - shame on me for not better knowing my first corps' history!) I was only 10 at the time, so I was too young & dopey to truly understand the magnitude of the situation, but the one thing I do remember (I related a bit of this on the Old Corps Photos thread a few days ago) was walking into the Manning Bowl for the first time as a 10-year old little boy with a bugle in his hands, and feeling like I had just walked into the middle of the Roman Colosseum!! A pretty cool first experience, and a big reason for why I stayed for the next 30 years! Something that dawned on me many years later about that first World Open experience... The World Open was famous for doing the Short Show at prelims (kids, ask your parents). We didn't even KNOW our concert yet! What if we were actually good enough to have made finals.....? My 2 brothers and sister were also marching with me that season, and I remember having a conversation with my brother about that very point. Being 6 years older, he had a much better perspective on things back then. He said, "We knew it wasn't going to be an issue. The only goal that the staff had for us was to not finish dead last." I was 10 - what did I know? The good news? We didn't finish last - we were 25th out of 26! I'm the shortie in the far left flank (1 of only 2 wearing pants - we didn't have all members of the musical ensemble wear pants until the next year. All girls in skirts...clinging to the traditions of our corps' all-girl roots!)

I have 2 shows that I remember as a performer, and 1 that I remember as a member of the audience: The 2 shows in which I participated as a performer were 83 finals in Miami, and 87 prelims in Madison, and the thing that has stuck in my mind about those 2 shows was that it wasn't about the audience response for the performances...it was that we hadn't even gotten on the field yet. '83 was unique because as everybody knows, no eastern corps had won DCI up to that point. We'd had a pretty good season, we lost prelims (kinda deservedly if you've ever seen the prelims video), but there was still a lot of anticipation that the audience could witness history being made that evening. All I can remember about that evening was the electricity coming out of the stands as we came through the gate. I believe we went on right after Phantom that night, and from the field, it felt as though the audience was thinking, "We need to be respectful to the performance on the field, but REALLY want to see what's up next!" Once we started moving onto the field and Mr. Crocker announced us, the crowd went NUTS!!! You don't ever really get to experience something like that on the Class A level, so it was quite the experience for me! From that moment, I was literally in a fog for about the next 2 hours. Don't remember playing a note, don't remember marching a step. The next thing I can literally remember about that evening was looking down & seeing a red, white & blue ribbon hanging around my neck. A pretty cool experience. '87 prelims was similar for me. As I recollect, we felt a little flat through warmups, and a little listless lining up in the tunnel to come on for prelims. Then...the rains came.... We were shoved into the walkway under the back stands to wait for the shower to pass, and it was though everybody woke up at the same exact time. Suddenly, we were the bull locked up in the chute trying to throw this knucklehead off our back in less than 8 seconds. When the rain had passed, it was a COMPLETELY different organization lining up to go out, and it was another instance where the audience felt it, too. Don't know who performed before us that evening, but I've always felt bad, because whereas in Miami, the audience continued to watch the performance on the field, in Madison they most certainly did not. You could feel the audience's involvement in the performance on the field slowly dissolving. And once again, when we hit the field, the crowd response was unbelievable. The one time I felt an "otherworldly crowd response" as a spectator was during prelims in Kansas City in '88. I was still marching, but that was the year that DCI decided to go with the BOA no-score-slotting to determine performance order, and no announcement of scores. You know....to heighten the suspense ;) We went on early enough in the show to be able to go back in and watch some corps, which we were rarely able to do because we usually went on late. I got into the stands and was able to find a decent seat just in time to see the Madison Scouts. We hadn't heard much about Madison that summer because that was the year they spent the early season in Europe, and I think we were only at 1 show with them prior to Nats. All I can remember was that they put on a performance that DARED you not to react. They did the "whirling dervish" move into the wedge at the end of Malaguena, and physically pulled me out of my seat along with 20,000 + other spectators. I was foolish enough prior to that moment to think that we were actually still competing with them, but suddenly found myself realizing that they were playing a completely different game than we were. I'd had the opportunity to witness a lot of great performances, but to have a performance completely strip me of my own control over my reactions was pretty darned cool!

More from Miami Barb Moroney...one of the best ever Can't have a big contest without a good retreat. That evening's "event within an event" was the most surreal experience I've ever had in my life!

1983 Garfield Cadets - Miami

More from Lodi Nationals

1983 Garfield Cadets - Lodi Nationals. Gotta love the stadiums with portable lights. The generators were so hard to tune to!!

Memorial Day, 1983 We seemed to start virtually every season with an incomplete uniform back in those days. My personal recollection: 16 years old, marching with the Big Boys......feelin' 10 foot tall & bulletproof!! Anybody who ever marched knows what I mean!

More pics from the Hawthorne show: