{"id":18197,"date":"2022-06-29T00:31:32","date_gmt":"2022-06-29T00:31:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/?p=18197"},"modified":"2022-06-28T19:33:02","modified_gmt":"2022-06-28T19:33:02","slug":"2022-fourth-of-july-grand-marshals","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/2022\/06\/29\/2022-fourth-of-july-grand-marshals\/","title":{"rendered":"2022 Fourth of July Grand Marshals"},"content":{"rendered":"

History Strikes On With The Nelson Family<\/i><\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

By Mike McKenna <\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"Hailey\u2019s annual Days of the Old West Fourth of July Parade is all about what makes our community so special. The parade honors our history and unique mountain-town charm and it stars the people who call this place home.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s why it\u2019s only fitting that Hailey\u2019s 141st parade for America\u2019s birthday honors the Nelson family as the grand marshals.<\/p>\n

\u00a0 <\/span>The Nelson family has been involved in local sports, especially baseball in the Wood River Valley, for generations. Thanks in large part to the Nelson family, Hailey is home to what is arguably the oldest Little League tournament in Idaho. And as that old Chevrolet commercial reminds us, there\u2019s nothing more American than \u201cbaseball, hotdogs and apple pie.\u201d<\/p>\n

That popular Chevy ad campaign came out shortly after the tournament changed it name from the \u201cWood River Valley\u201d to the \u201cRay Nelson\u201d Invitational Little League Tournament in 1972.<\/p>\n

Ray Nelson was born in Oakley, Idaho, in 1929, and passed away of a heart attack in the summer of 1970. His passing left behind his beloved wife, Marian, and enough kids to field a baseball team.<\/p>\n

Paul, the oldest of the children, had been the star player of the 1957 Hailey Wolverines team that became the first local squad to win the tournament. Paul hit a homer and got the save by striking out the final batter. Ray had been a coach on that team, while Paul\u2019s little brother, Mike Nelson, served as batboy.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose were great times,\u201d Mike said.<\/p>\n

The tournament was originally started by Civil Defense Sergeant Bill Houser with help from lots of locals over the years, like Ned Bell, John Miller, Buddy Isom, Ed Uhrig and, of course, the Nelson family.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a real community deal,\u201d Mike said. \u201cWe never had any trouble getting help.\u201d<\/p>\n

Teams for that first tournament came from across southern Idaho, with Filer winning the first title. The 50th Anniversary of the Nelson tg kids coming from the same towns, like Boise and Twin Falls, that played in the inaugural event 65 years ago. <\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s one of the things that makes the Ray Nelson tournament so magical\u2014hundreds of Little League baseball players from throughout Idaho have played in the tournament over the years, just like their dads or moms, aunts or uncles, or granddads did.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s an honor to our family and a testament to this community\u2019s love of baseball that it\u2019s gone on for so long. It\u2019s really cool to see people come back for generations and play in the same tournament their dads or grandparents played in,\u201d said Matt Nelson, one of Ray\u2019s grandsons who played in the tournament as a kid.<\/p>\n

The competition is always tough at the Ray Nelson and it\u2019s not too often that our local teams get to win any hardware. But this year, the 12U Outlaws took home the Silver Bracket Championships. Meanwhile, the 10U Colts (which included Ray\u2019s great-grandson, Dyson Nelson) battled their way to grab medals for taking second place. The baseball gods were certainly smiling on Hailey that day.<\/p>\n

The Chamber is taking parade float entries as well as donations for the fireworks until Friday, July 1. To sign up or find out more, go to ValleyChamber.org, contact Info@ValleyChamber.org or call (208) 788-3484.<\/i><\/p>\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

History Strikes On With The Nelson Family By Mike McKenna Hailey\u2019s annual Days of the Old West Fourth of July Parade is all about what makes our community so special. The parade honors our history and unique mountain-town charm and it stars the people who call this place home. That\u2019s why it\u2019s only fitting that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":10323,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","_pvb_checkbox_block_on_post":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[70,38],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-18197","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-chamber-corner","8":"category-sponsored"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18197","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18197"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18202,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18197\/revisions\/18202"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10323"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/woodriverweekly.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}