2009 Charlevoix Petunia Planting
On the Thursday afternoon before Memorial Day some 500 Charlevoix residents turn out to plant some 50,000 petunias along Charlevoix's main street. (Bridge St.)
This event started in 1982 with a meeting of a newly organized group called "Keep Charlevoix Beautiful" was meeting to discuss ways of making "Charlevoix-The-Beautiful more beautiful. Mother nature had already blessed this community with her own beauty marks, but Charlevoix is not a community that is content to sit on its laurels.
The credit for the idea goes to long time City resident Dale Boss who said he had dreamed of the idea of planting a ribbon of petunias down each side of the roadway city limit to city limit for years.
When the planters started planting at four o'clock the temperatures were in the low seventies with a "slight" chance of rain. By five o'clock the slight chance of rain had turned into a warm sprinkle. By time the job was finished at six it was raining hard and the temperature had dropped into the fifties. Nothing at all unusual about that for Northern Michigan.
Read the full Petunia story by visiting the Keep Charlevoix Beautiful web site. It will only take a few weeks for the Petunias to fully fill in ready for your summer visit. To learn about Charlevoix's summer activities including the "The Trout Tournament" June 12th, "The Taste of Charlevoix" June 20th, all the summer concerts and art festivals visit the Charlevoix Chamber of Commerce web site.
You're invited to join us for dinner, dancing and reminiscing. Location The Castle (1 mile south of Charlevoix M-66) Dinner provided by Charlevoix's famous Gray Gables Restaurant. Click this link for more information.