Cruisin’ Monterey & Street Dance Set for August 13
As part of the festivities celebrating the 100th birthday of the building that is now The Highland Center, Cruisin’ Monterey and the Street Dance are set for Saturday.
Cappie Hull is helping to organize Cruisin’ Monterey.
“I am just excited about celebrating our old school house, which is now called The Highland Center, and I can only imagine all the different vehicles that have graced that parking lot over the last 100 years,” says Hull. “So, in order to celebrate that history, we are inviting people to come to our town and cruise the streets of Monterey on Saturday, August 13. We hope that folks will just cruise, stop, park and talk to each other and visit the businesses in town. Our restaurants are sponsoring special foods. Hull’s Hideaway is going to feature 1950’s-60’s foods and serve hamburgers, french fries and root beer floats. High’s Restaurant is going to feature a 1920’s sandwich called the Prosperity Sandwich. They’re also encouraging folks to dress up in costume of the period that they choose, between 1922 and now, and they’re going to have a costume contest at 1 o’clock and the diners there at that time will be the judges and then High’s Restaurant is giving $100 as the prize for best costume in celebration of the school turning 100 years. Then other businesses on Main, Claire’s Café is featuring coffee and pastries and The Curly Maple is going to sell pop in a glass bottle along with peanuts.”
The Street Dance will also be part of the celebration. It’s an old summer tradition with a new location this year. It will be held outside in front of The Highland Center.
Ellen Ratcliffe of Monterey, along with her husband Eugene, will be calling figures for the street dance.
“I’m sure there’s lots of people that remember the good times that we had there on that gym floor in that old building,” says Ratcliffe. “We all gathered there from McDowell and Blue Grass, and we made new friends and so forth. It was a busy place, we just had lots of things going on. I graduated from Highland High School, now my husband, Eugene, he was a member of the last graduating class of ‘63. I was a junior and we moved over to the new school in November of ‘63 and then I graduated, second class to graduate from the new school. Saying the new school, it’s, what, almost sixty years old now but yes, that was the new school. I think we made our memories and our forever friends and so forth there at that old school. So, when we moved, we just took our friends, we took our good teachers and we continued on over there, but it just seemed like the memories that we made were there at the Monterey High School building.”
The 100th Birthday Celebration of The Highland Center building is Saturday, August 13. Cruisin’ Monterey is from noon to 6. The Highland Center will open and food will be available for purchase beginning at 5pm. The Little Switzerland Cloggers perform at 6 and the Street Dance starts at 7. Cruisin’ Monterey, the clogging performance and the dance are free.
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