This year, when Darrell Klampe rides through The Dalles as the Grand Marshal of the Northwest Cherry Festival, the title will be new to him, but the experience of being in the parade won’t be.
Klampe moved to The Dalles in 1957, and even though he didn’t grow up in the Gorge, the spirit of The Dalles comes through Darrell in his love of cherries and agriculture. As a Master Gardener, Klampe was revered around The Dalles for his delicious raspberries and his gift to always grow the biggest, tastiest garlic. More than just his green thumbs, he was known for his generosity, as he was always more than happy to give his crops away. In fact, Klampe would donate his garlic to local restaurants, even going so far as to teach one of the restaurant owners how to grow garlic themselves.
Klampe also used to spend time in the orchards every year with a friend who was an orchardist, and he would even take the kids picking. Even now, he asks his step-daughter Keri Day to make him a cherry cobbler every year during cherry season.
It’s easy to see why, then, he’s always loved the Northwest Cherry Festival. From the time it started, he and his wife, Analea, always took their family to enjoy the festivities. They were such regulars, in fact, that they always knew exactly where downtown to stand to watch; it was their own special spot, where they would watch as a family.
A few times, however, he found himself looking at his family from inside the parade itself: Once with the Lions Club, and a few times from inside the comfort of his Pontiac GTO, even as recently as five years ago, Day said.
Now, decades after he and his family first started attending, it’s become a family tradition, spanning four generations.
“He used to take us every year and then once the grandkids came along, the grandkids would come up and he’d take them too,” Day said.
Klampe isn’t just a Cherry Festival veteran; he’s also a retired veteran of the U.S. Navy. He spent two years deployed in Bermuda and was in reserves for well over 30 years.
Though serving one’s country is, by nature, dangerous, Klampe also found space to have fun. It helped that he was able to stay safe, which is something he partially attributed to his mother.
“I think my mother saved me because I think she went to my commander and wrote him a letter,” Klampe said. “She said, ‘Take good care of my boy, I only have one.’”
It wasn’t until after serving in Bermuda that Darrell moved to The Dalles and started working for the State of Oregon. His career would change and move around a bit, especially when he would leave for a few weeks here and there with the Navy reserves, but he always ended up back in The Dalles and back at Cherry Festival.
Ultimately, his favorite memories of the Cherry Festival always come back to driving his GTO in the parade. And even though Klampe may not be in his GTO this year, he is excited to take the parade by storm and show off his starpower.
“I’m just too famous, what can I say?” he said with a laugh.
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