There was no finer day to be a student of St. Albert’s than festival day. This usually happened the last week or so of school. The festivals that the little friends had during their tenure at St. Albert’s were small compared with St. Albert’s later festivals in the early 2000, which were gigantic and far larger than even St. Sebastian’s festival. But the intimate small festivals that the Class of ’75 attended were by far the best festivals ever, even better than Boblo or Cedar point because they were with both their friends and family and it would last well into the night.
Usually all classes would be given a half day off to enjoy the festival and there were plenty of activities to choose from on that day. Sack races, water balloon tosses, egg tosses, and even baseball and soccer games would take place in the field behind the gym. The field was large enough to handle all these events simultaneously and these activities were specifically for the students and were only available to them on this half school day as other events would take place on the field over the weekend. The main festival would go on all weekend and could be enjoyed by young and old. There would always be a moonwalk and the students would go in group. Whenever the time expired the students would all go to one corner and feign that they could not get out. Whoever was operating the moonwalk would have to go in and order them out. The goal in pretending you were stuck in a corner was simple, you were hoping not to be noticed and you would get a second ride for free. Another popular item was the dunk tank. The little friends would wait until someone they knew was in the tank and then throw balls until they hit the lever and dunked the individual. There was not a schedule but there were certainly rumors who was going to be in that dunk tank and when. When that certain someone would appear, the little friends were waiting to dunk them.
Some years there would be a high striker where you would use a mallet to hit a lever that shot an item upwards to ring a bell at the top. There would be prizes of varying degrees as the item shot upwards from earth with the best prizes at the top where the bell was. Other popular items were tractor rides through the ground which included the parking lot and the field up to the creek.
Inside there were more activities. The meeting room would have a bake sale, and the gymnasium would have all sorts of carnival style activities. A favorite was trying to knock over two coke bottles with a ball by rolling it toward the bottles. This sounded easy but it wasn’t. Another was popping balloons with a dart that also looked easy but often was not. For the little ones the duck pond was always a sure winner. Dozens of rubber ducks would be floating around in a small pond and at the bottom of each duck was a number. The child would select a duck, read the number on the bottom, and then receive the corresponding prize.
For the more adventurous was a haunted house in one of the classrooms of the senior building. You would walk in and there would be a group of decorated manikins lining the windows (blacked out of course) opposite the door. Usually a 7th or 8th grade student would be hiding in there as well and as you got close to see the manikins they would jump out and scare you (this was actually the inspiration for “The Knights Dungeon” haunted house, an event the little friends put on for about a decade 20 years later).
The games in the gym would close up in the evening and the gym would be set up for dancing with a live band, usually the “Polkatels” or the “Tempo Tones”. Dinner tables were set up and families could order up a full meal and enjoy it without having to leave the grounds. Pop and beer would be available and ice cold as it was kept in a 50 gallon drum filled with ice water. Some of the more “brilliant” little friends would challenge each other to see who could hold their hand in the ice water the longest (an act that can cause severe nerve damage so please don’t try this).
The dancing would go on until about midnight or so and that gave the little friends ample time to spend together listening to the bands play while their parents danced away the evening. Everyone was up past pre-determined bed times but that’s what made these festivals so much fun, doing things that you don’t normally do once a year.
