TOWN OF EL PASO – Did you know Honeycrest Farms on County Road BB is a suburb of El Paso? Well, if you didn’t, you do now. At least according to this year’s 2024 El Paso Days grand marshal Larry Traynor. He will share the honor with his wife of 42 years Linda on Sunday, Aug. 18.

Larry has lived near El Paso for 60 years, while Linda arrived 42 years ago. They ran a dairy farm up until about five years ago, along with raising honeybees, beef and crops. These days, they’re crop farming about 1,600 acres. According to Linda, Larry eats breakfast every day at 5:45 a.m. and heads to the farm to wait for everyone else to get there.

They don’t have to think long when asked what makes El Paso a special place.

“I think it’s because of the people that live here or have lived here,” Larry said. “El Paso like I said is a suburb of Honeycrest.”

“It’s the friendships that everybody has,” Linda said. “Everybody knows everybody.”

It was the couple’s children (Larry’s daughter Donna Danielson, son Dale Traynor and Linda’s kids Michelle Simonson and Matt Dardine) and Linda who convinced Larry to accept the grand marshal distinction.

“My kids and wife changed my mind,” he admitted begrudgingly.

El Paso Days Committee and Community Club member Merlin Blaisdell said Larry was a charter member of the El Paso Community Club, which helps out families in need.

“It was Larry, Ivan Shafer, Rich Anderson, Donnie and me,” Blaisdell said. “I had just retired from the Army a year before that and I had never seen an El Paso Days before. I thought, ‘why can’t we do that? Why can’t we organize an El Paso Days?’”

Larry and others donated $20 that first year to get things rolling. Since he had previous experience with parades, he was put in charge of the now iconic El Paso Days Grand Parade. As vice president of the Community Club, it was part of his duties, which he took seriously. He retired from that role in 2024.

“One of the bylaws said that VP was supposed to be parade chairman,” Larry said. “It is a lot of work and you need some good volunteers and we had good volunteers. I always had a group of people who were excellent. It was mostly a case of letting them know what I expected them to do. Once they did for one year, most of them would come back and then they already knew what the score was and we could just go down the list.”

When he first started overseeing the parade, communication problems between the front of the parade and the lineup was poor. They solved the problem with walkie talkies.

“Of course, once the parade starts we have people up on this end who help steer the parade and keep things moving,” Larry said. “One thing I always stressed about our parade is that the time set for our parade to start was 2 p.m. and our parade would start at 2 o’clock.”

He took pride in the parade’s organization, which has numbered as many as 100 floats, and promptness in starting on time.

“We move the parade along,” he said. “There are no long gaps. That is what I always stressed was to keep things moving.”

Blaisdell said the local themes and quirks in the parade draw people from far and wide. His favorites were the West El Paso Horseshoe Club’s foray on skis or the year they served “communion” from a replica of St. Joseph’s Church.

“People like to know what we’re coming up with this year,” he smiled.

The El Paso Days Committee picks a theme each year in February. This year’s festivities center around music from the 60s and 70s.

“All of us that are involved, at least us older folks, we lived through it,” Blaisdell said. “Though in Larry’s case, we should have added the 50s.”

The Traynors were also active in the Sno Valley Riders Snowmobile Club for many years. Larry served on the Pierce County Snowmobile Council as past president and on the St. John’s Church Council.

“Throughout the last 33 years for El Paso Days, Honeycrest Farms has allowed the use of two fields down there on the south end. The last several years we haven’t charged anything. The use of those two fields has been donated,” Larry said. “It was difficult to organize this whole thing and hold it without space.”

The land now plays host to horse trail and ATV rides, parking and the car show.

“He’s been a really big support over the years,” Blaisdell said. “It’s a big deal and you have to be willing to have volunteers who say ‘I can take care of that.’”

El Paso Days is held Aug. 16-18 with many family friendly events to choose from. Visit the “El Paso Community Club” on Facebook.