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picnics a tradition in many parishes

Story and photos by LIZ QUIRIN
Messenger editor

It’s the middle of the summer and parish picnics are in full swing.

To many people, picnics mean a chicken dinner or a buffet and a chance to play Bingo. Many of the picnics feature hand sewn quilts, and someone checks to make sure no machine-made quilts slip through the door.

Talking with some avid Bingo players at the picnic at St. Anthony in Beckemeyer, I discovered one of the parish quilters playing Bingo to try to win a quilt. Somehow it didn’t seem right. She was playing Bingo with a group of ladies from St. Anthony and other parishes.

Looking at the beautiful quilts hanging on a rack behind the Bingo caller waiting to be won, I asked the ladies: “Have you ever seen an ugly quilt?”

They laughed. “Oh yes,” they said, but they didn’t see any at this picnic.

Another woman, Rita Fohne from St. Joseph in Lebanon said she had studied Bingo, reading a book on how to play the odds and win more often. She was choosing a card for her sister-in-law who was visiting.

Does the system work? I asked. More often than not, she said.

Checking with people who work at parish picnics provides a glimpse into the “anatomy of a picnic.”
Some picnics have a new chairperson or committee every few years, citing a high burn-out rate as the reason for the change.

Others, like St. Boniface in Germantown, have had the same “outdoor” chairman for 12 years. “It’s ’til death do we part,” Bob Beckmann said of his role as chairman.

He said he looks forward to the picnic at St. Boniface held every year on the last Tuesday in July.
He co-chairs the picnic with Joan Theising who is in charge of the dining hall and kitchen, and the “co-chair of everything,” Beckmann said.

“I don’t look at it as a chore,” Beckmann said. “A lot of great people chair the stands and work in the stands.”
The picnic has a long history of success both within the parish and outside. Many people know about it because it’s on a Tuesday.

Many of the people attending the picnic go to “show off” their children and grandchildren, Beckmann said. “It’s like a family reunion for all people who lived in Germantown.”

At neighboring St. Dominic Parish in Breese, the weather somewhat interfered with this year’s June 18 picnic.
Jack Lampen co-chaired the picnic with Paul Klostermann.

This is Lampen’s fourth year and Klostermann’s first.

Lampen said much organization is done ahead of time, but sometimes plans have to be changed at the last minute.
This year, storms forced workers to move tents after rain and straight-line winds caused the chairmen to question whether they would have to postpone the picnic.

Klostermann said he and Lampen decided to go ahead with the picnic, and “it went real well.”
The rains stopped before the picnic opened and began again after midnight when the picnic was over, Klostermann said.
“I thought the hand of God was working there,” Klostermann said. “It’s a lot of work, but it pays off.”

Lampen agreed and said sometimes tough decisions must be made and the workers look to the chairmen to make those decisions.

This year, as in other years, Lampen said the picnic “was fabulous” and a “very rewarding experience.”

On the east side of the diocese, Laura Sterchi and Francis Ochs co-chair the July 17 picnic at St. Joseph in Stringtown.

In Stringtown, people serve on the picnic committee for three years, Sterchi said. In the third year, they become the picnic’s co-chair and then rotate off the committee. The picnic, she said “is always on Sunday.”

Sterchi said asking for and collecting prizes for the raffle and ordering other prizes and food takes time. And at St. Joseph’s, “we assign everybody in the parish a job,” Sterchi said. “It takes everybody to make it go.”

One of the special features of this picnic is the smorgasbord with homemade noodles. “We have a noodle day,” she said, and they make 100 1lb. or 1 1/2 lb. bags of noodles.

While they have a quilt raffle, and they do have Bingo; they don’t have enough quilts for Bingo prizes.
Stringtown’s neighbor, Holy Cross in Wendelin is looking forward to a parish picnic, traditionally held the first Sunday in August.

Cindy Blank, on the workers’ committee this year and the picnic committee last year, said everyone works together to make the picnic a success.

People on the picnic committee begin meeting monthly in February and then weekly in July so they can be ready for the picnic in August.

“I never knew how much work the committee did until I was on it,” Blank said, “but it’s so worth it.”

Part of the work includes gathering prizes for their three different raffles, and again parishioners step up. One man, a woodworker, provides a cabinet or other hand made piece for the raffle, and several people donate quilts to the parish.

Others donate home grown fruits and vegetables and baked goods to the country store, Blank said.
The week of the picnic, work begins Thursday night, continues all day Friday and Saturday because, Blank said, “the picnic is really big,” drawing people from as far away as Decatur, Ill.

Besides the outdoor activities, Bingo, games and a variety of bands and singers — including Rhonda Kuenstler, the parish choir director — the picnic boasts an “awesome” chicken dinner, Blank said. As with other picnics, “parishioners work together to make it a success,” she said.

At St. Boniface in Evansville, pastor Father Ben Stern, said the June 18 picnic this year was a bigger success than last year.

The picnic was moved from the parish hall to the Knights of Columbus hall because of problems with the parish hall air conditioning.

That actually gave the picnic more visibility, picnic chairman, Amy Bauer, said.

“We had a lot more foot traffic,” Bauer said because the Knights have their hall right on the main road in Evansville.
Being a working wife and mother and on the parish council makes it difficult to set aside more time for the picnic, but Bauer said “it’s worth it. It’s a way to give back to the parish.”

At St. John the Baptist in Red Bud, the picnic runs for two nights, July 8 and 9.

Parish secretary Rhonda Juelfs and bookkeeper Kelly Donjon handle the picnic ordering, backed by a group of people who help with setting up and working in the booths, cooking and serving the dinners and working the Bingo, Juelfs said.

At St. John’s people can find a quilt and cash bingo on both nights with a fish fry meal on Friday and a chicken dinner buffet on Saturday.

This will be Juelfs and Donjon’s ninth year coordinating the picnic. Both were hired in 2003, right before the picnic.
“It was a little exciting and a little scary” that first year, Juelfs said, and “a lot of great volunteers pointed us in the right direction.”

Each year, Juelfs said, they try to do small things differently, just to give people a different view of the picnic.
At St. James in Millstadt, people will gather at the parish on Aug. 6 for the picnic.

Marlene Herrmann, involved in the picnic for many years, said the big draw for their picnic is the chicken dinner in the air-conditioned parish hall and the quilt Bingo.

Herrmann said many people have chaired the same stands for years, and that makes it easier in the planning.
The picnic gives parishioners a chance to get together to reconnect, to visit and to relax, pastor Msgr. Marvin Volk said.

“It’s a way to build community,” he said.

Money raised at parish picnics is used in a variety of ways. Sometimes it is earmarked for special projects, and other times it goes into the parish's general fund to offset operating expenses, people said.