Wellsville residents will celebrate America’s 250th birthday by holding a big citywide event on July 11 at Kiwanis Ballpark.

The event, which is called “Small Town, Big Freedom,” will start at 10 a.m. with a softball tournament and will end with a flag ceremony at 8:30 p.m. It is sponsored by the Wellsville Chamber of Commerce.

Chamber officials started working on the event in February. They will release the full schedule of events at their meeting, which is scheduled for 6 p.m. on June 3.

“We’re hoping it’s a chance for the general community to come out for a nice fun day, low pressure good time,” Chamber Treasurer Caren Whitehead said.

Whitehead shared the news about the event at the Wellsville Board of Aldermen meeting on May 28. She handed out maps to board members and asked if anyone would like to speak at the flag ceremony.
Whitehead said the Chamber got permission from board members to hold the event.

“I actually went looking for an obituary from 1976, not thinking it was the Bicentennial year,” she said. “Flipping through the newspaper, you saw all of the different events and speakers that the community was having. We had approached the council here asking if anybody had anything planned. They said, ‘No, nothing had been planned so far.’ So we asked for the opportunity to do it.”

The slowpitch softball tournament is organized by the Wellsville Community Athletic League. The cost is $100 per team and registration ends on July 1.

Whitehead said there will be more activities at the all-day event.

“We have a couple of other groups that are trying to maybe get a 3-on-3 basketball tournament going on,” she said. “We’ll see what we end up with. We’ll have a lot of little fun free activities for the kids, like tattoos, balloons or bubbles and that sort of thing.”

Whitehead said Wellsville residents are looking forward to celebrating America’s Semiquincentennial at their hometown.

“A lot of different groups that we talked to so far seemed to be very excited about it and everybody seemed to think that it was a good idea, so we’re hoping it translates to people showing up for it and enjoying the day,” she said.