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I’ll tell you what’s up…the tempo and the volume….at Rock the Dock, the 4^th of July Waterfront Street Party at the Port of Friday Harbor.  This is the 10^th annual event, always featuring the fabulous and famous Timebenders and sponsored by the local Rotary club. Undoubtedly the best all-ages Vegas-style, live-music-with-some-comedy family- street-dance on the planet.  The Rotary runs the beer garden, the Lions Club cooks the food, the San Juan Island Yacht Club gets in on the act by having a BBQ for members and guests, the Chamber of Commerce shoots off the fireworks, and all the gate proceeds go to support the eradication of polio.  It starts at 6:00 pm, after the parade, which starts about 10:30 am, and also after the 152^nd Annual Pig War Picnic at the Historical Museum, which starts after the parade.  It’s a full day of fun.

This year marks the 152^nd annual Pig War Picnic, although technically, the first year it was called Lyman Cutler’s 4^th of July Beach Pignic Roast.  Seems that back in 1859, San Juan Island was claimed by both the United States and Great Britain, and consequently the island was populated by US citizens, British citizens, and a contingent of British soldiers.  Sheep farming and making whiskey were the principal occupations, with whale watching a distant third.  Anyway, the US patriots planned an Independence Day celebration down at 4^th of July Beach, which is now part of American Camp.  Lyman Cutler, a US citizen who lived near the beach, promised to provide the pork for the event, even though Lyman was not a pork producer, but was instead a locally famous tuber grower.  Tubers were a versatile food and  an ingredient in the manufacture of alcohol.  Cutler’s neighbor, Charles Griffin, was both a Brit and a pork producer.  One of Griffin’s porkers followed a trail of tubers into Cutler’s garden, where the pork perpetrator was popped as a trespasser, shot, bled, and butchered.  Griffin objected to this presumptive prosecution of his porcine property, and the called upon the local British garrison to arrest Cutler and confiscate the intended 4^th of July pignic main course.  Cutler sent an appeal to the US Army in Bellingham, and his promise of pork poached from the Brits and a tuber-fueled 4^th of July beach party proved irresistible to Colonel Pickett.  Led by the futurely famous Colonel, the Army charged onto 4^th of July Beach, the pork was roasted, the tuber-pop was plentiful, some cannons made fireworks, and the Pig War was engaged. For the next 151 years, San Juan Island has had an unusually enthusiastic 4^th of July celebration.  Part of that celebration has been an annual Pig Shoot event.  Over the years, the event has evolved, beginning in the early days with a strict re-enactment of the original entrapment scenario, held in Lyman’s garden and well attended by US and Brits alike.  Later, the event turned into an island wide pig hunt, in which a red-painted pig was turned loose on the island for capture.  After a few years of this, some enterprising pig hunters found it easier to paint a neighbor’s pig red and then shoot it.  Next, the Pig Shoot used penned pigs as targets, but in the late 60’s some souvenir Viet Nam heavy artillery operated by the local Survivalist Club put an end to that practice.  In the 90’s, pigs and paint-gun equipped poachers were set loose in a large field, and score was kept of the number of paint popped pigs.  Last year, there were no pigs available on the island, so the local high school football players reluctantly agreed to don pig costumes (pigskins, get it?)  and stand in for the pigs.  The team trotted out onto the killing field, soon followed by the paint-gun equipped poachers, which group included an unusually high ratio of high school teachers. The event began in a lively fashion, and the poachers soon had the piggies cornered in front of the viewing stand.  The poachers closed in, taunting the cowering piggies, and firing an occasional paint ball into their midst.  Suddenly, with a chorus of Deliverance squeals, the pig costumes were torn off, revealing wild-haired blue-painted warriors brandishing highly sophisticated paint weaponry.  The team lined up in formation, and on a squeal from the Quarterback, they sprang forward unleashing their paintball artillery.  Volley after volley of the stinging paintballs repeatedly raked the row of recently rude educators, bringing them to their knees whilst shouting pleas of surrender. The warriors, splendid in jock straps and blue paint, soon had their former teachers hog-tied and piled in a very photogenic heap.  There was some alarm among the spectators, as one of the piled poachers was the recently elected Sheriff, but the warrior-piggies turned out to be reasonable, and everyone ended up having a good time.  This year, the Pig Shoot Committee has been taken over by catapult enthusiasts, and it is rumored that the shoot will be more like a Pig Toss, or a Pig Launch.  I sure hope so.

Anyway, come to Friday Harbor for the 4^th of July, and for sure bring everyone you know to the Rock the Dock Waterfront Street Party.  Tickets are available from Friday Harbor Marine,  360-378-6202, or email capncrabby@fridayharbormarine.com.