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Colonel Popp was parade’s founder
Dear Editor,
I would like to correct an inaccuracy in the June 4 edition.
With all respect to Duke Smith and the great deal he did for our town, he did not found the Mountain Lakes Memorial Day parade.
My father, Colonel Henry Popp (retired), a resident of the town since 1930, was the sole founder back in the 1950’s. A WWII veteran of the Pacific Theater of war, he was upset at the lack of any official acknowledgement of our service people and so decided to do something about it. He founded and ran the parade single-handedly for over four decades.
It was only when he’d reached his early 80s and the enormous amount of work involved became a burden, that he reluctantly stepped aside. In thanks, he was chosen as the new committee’s first Grand Marshal.
Because of his efforts and tremendous devotion to Mountain Lakes, generations of Lakers grew up marching with a school band, a Cub pack or Brownie troop or one of our former mayors. For years, he found speakers, arranged music and made sure everyone knew when and where they were needed and that they got there on time.
An entire committee now does the work he did himself for years.
Henry still lives in town, is now 90 years old and continues to celebrate the day, reminiscing about old friends, many no longer with us.
The parade is larger now, but old time Lakers, folks here from the 1950s, ‘60s, ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s, know that the debt of its existence is owed entirely to my father.
Elizabeth Eden
Mountain Lakes
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