Paige Hassen: JRN

The city of Clare, Mich. hosts an annual Irish Festival every year around St. Patrick’s Day. This year, they celebrated 49 years and are preparing for their 50th.

Lacey Badelt was the Chair of the 49th Annual Irish Festival. She asked someone else to help her, so her title changed to Co-Chair of the festival.

Badelt believes the parade is one of the biggest draws of the festival.

“It is historically, incredibly packed full with great small businesses and organizations and community members that just love celebrating our Irish heritage,” said Badelt.

This year, Clare awarded a community member the title of “Clare’s Littlest Leprechaun.”

“It’s not who you think,” Badelt said. “It is Jane Sarter… She’s the epitome of celebrating Clare, so I’m very excited to have the chance to honor her.”

Jane Sarter, 90, was born in Alma, Mich., but has lived in Clare for over 67 years. Sarter has been a staple in the Clare community ever since, and loves being involved with the Irish Festival.

“I was the Grand Marshall in 2004,” Sarter said.

This year, on top of being Clare’s Littlest Leprechaun, Sarter also judged the Leprechaun contest, but abstained in the adult category due to her daughter, Diane, competing. Diane ended up winning the contest, too.

“We would like you to come down and the parade,” Sarter said.

“Lots of things going on,” Diane said, “There’s live music, there’s dancing, fire juggling, so it’s great.”

In addition to the parade, there is a “bed race” every year.

“She was actually in the ‘pace bed” for 15 years,” Diane said of her mother.

Being Grand Marshall and being in the pace bed are Sarter’s favorite memories of the festival so far.

“I had four girls pushing me,” Sarter said of the bed race, “It was hilarious.”

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My experience:

Clare’s Irish Festival fell on the weekend of St. Paddy’s Day. Since St. Paddy’s Day is an Irish holiday, I assume it falls on this weekend most of the time. With that being said, that means it falls on one of the busiest weekends of the year, especially in college. There are lots of events going on, family and friends coming in and out of town, so it was a lot to manage. Luckily, Clare is only about half an hour away, so it wasn’t too hard to cover.

Knowing that it would be hard to interview one of the organizers since they would be busy with events around the parade, I was able to do my first interview in advance. I got in contact with her, Lacey, through the Clare Irish Festival’s Facebook page. I was told where to show up and at what time, and that’s exactly what I did. The day before the parade and events, downtown Clare was already so alive.

It was through that first interview that I asked if there were any stories to note about people involved. That’s how Lacey led me to Mrs. Sarter. She was such a joy. I spent more time there than I was planning, but it was wonderful. That’s the part of photojournalism that I love.

The parade itself was unimaginably beautiful to witness. There were so many people out, so much green, so many smiles, loud music, food, firepits in the streets. I couldn’t help but just smile as I watched.