Building community - it's what Cherry Fair grand marshals are all about

Louise and John Van Schoonhoven love living in Cove and being involved in the community. They will be honored as grand marshals of the Cove Cherry Fair Saturday. Photo/AMBER GLAZE

In 1998 the Van Schoonhovens helped in the creation of the Cove Community Association, which restarted the historic Cherry Fair. This year the fair is celebrating its 10th annual anniversary.

When speaking about being selected grand marshals of the Cherry Fair, which takes place Saturday, John and Louise said they are honored.

Helping keep the community cohesive and strong are important to the Van Schoonhovens, as their involvement with the CCA proves.

“A friend of mine from childhood asked me, ‘John, are you an old-timer or a newcomer?’ I didn’t think much of it. Then, I got to thinking about it: People in a small community

shouldn’t be identified by those things whether they are a newcomer or an old-timer, whether they are young or old, gender, ethnicity and beliefs,’’ John said. “There ought to be a way to bridge all of those gaps in a true community. So that’s what we have been working on all this time and have been fortunate to be involved in working on that, so it’s been a great experience.”

John said that the original Cherry Fair ended around 1918 because of World War I.

“We restarted it in the year 2000. This fair now has been here longer than the original one.”

He said some things are different now with the fair, but overall it is the same idea.

“They had a cherry court — Queen Ann and King Bing — who were high school level kids. Now, it’s the same thing but they are 4- to 7-year-old kids in the parade,’’ John said. “Now we have a lot of entertainment. They didn’t have things like fun runs, as they do this year. This year we are going to have more exhibits than before. The fair brings people in Cove together and people around the valley together.”

That is one of the reasons the Van Schoonhovens decided to move back to Cove upon retirement — a strong sense of community.

“We’ve lived in places near Washington, D.C., and Lake Oswego but it’s hard to get a group of people together in a large community,’’ John said. “But Cove has that ability, and that’s why we came back.”

John grew up in a homestead, one that’s still standing on Lantz Lane near their current home on Love Road. Louise grew up in Baker City.

John and Louise have shared a life together both working in the field of education. They met at Eastern. Louise remembered, “We met each other 45 years ago and we are going to celebrate our anniversary Aug. 22.”

Prior to meeting John, Louise started off as an elementary teacher. After graduating from Eastern she taught first and second-graders in California.

“At that time teachers were in great demand,’’ she said. “They came up from California and recruited us to the San Francisco Bay area.”

She also taught in Labrador, for the Air Force in its dependents school there. “After that I returned home and had a job at Eastern for a while where I met John.” Louise got her master’s from Johns Hopkins University.

Prior to meeting Louise, John had spent time as a teacher and principal in Milton-Freewater then went to work with the Oregon Education Association and the National Education Association. He taught as a principal for an international school overseas in Tokyo then came back to Eastern and that’s when he met Louise.

John received his doctorate at the University of Oregon.

In John’s career he taught education at all levels. At Eastern he taught education administration.

They spent 25 years living and working on the East Coast.

Louise remembers fascinating experiences back East.

“John met a couple presidents at the White House,’’ she said. “One, John had worked with the Department of Education writing a book called ‘Growing up Drug Free,’ which was published by the Department of Education. When that was presented by George Bush, John met him.”

Later on, John was a principal at an elementary school that was recognized as a Blue Ribbon school, which was an award given to an outstanding school of education. So, John went to the White House when Bill Clinton was president and received an award for the school and one for himself.

When John retired they moved home to Cove.

When they got settled in Cove they began to get involved in community activities. John has written many grants for the community.

“One thing that came up was the development of the Strategic Plan for the community,’’ John said. “We received money from the Forest Service and we gathered 100 people during seven months to put together a plan for the community. That was 13 years ago.”

Out of that came together a group called the Cove Community Association that puts on the Cherry Fair, Clean-Up Day, The Education Foundation (which provides help to students who are not at top education levels) and another dozen or so groups around the community.

“Usually when a city does a strategic plan the follow-through doesn’t last too long,’’ John said. “Somehow we have kept this going the whole time. We are really excited about the fact that we have that kind of organization in a community that is looking at two basic goals: one, improving the quality of live and two, building a sense of community. We look at everything we do in those ways. Some of the people that were on the board 13 years ago are still on there.”

Louise has also been involved in the Cove Library, which was established more than 100 years ago. Louise got computers, cataloged and books and established a history room for the library.

When planning for the future of Cove with the goals of the community, John said, “We want people to talk over backyard fences, wave at people whether they know them or not and be able ride a horse down the street. Quality place but small place.”