Rockford’s Festival of Lights is a key fundraiser for America’s 250th birthday fireworks
By Steve Summers and Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
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ROCKFORD — This year’s Festival of Lights is not only spreading holiday cheer for the Christmas season. It’s also setting the stage for America’s 250th birthday party.
Organizers of the annual lights display have stressed all season that donations you make toward Festival of Lights will go toward putting on a grand fireworks display this coming July 4, which is the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. The all volunteer Rockford 4th of July Civic Committee puts on both events without the use of any tax dollars.
“We really count on the Festival of Lights to carry this, our fireworks show,” Ted O’Donnell, co-chairman of the civic committee, said on This Week in the Stateline. “We want to give Rockford a huge show to commemorate our country’s birth.”
Related: ‘Labor of love’ from small volunteer crew keeps Rockford’s Festival of Lights running
O’Donnell has been beating the drum for donations this year because he said they’ve tapered off since 2020, and he wants to raise enough cash to put on a major display for America’s 250th.
It costs the committee about $60,000 to pay for the pyrotechnics display, and the overall cost of the event is more than $80,000 when you factor in insurance, permits, food and beverage supply, and other costs.
“We literally, on Jan. 2, cut a check to Pyrotecnico for whatever the donation amounts are that we have to put our deposit in for the fireworks,” O’Donnell said. “We empty out our account immediately to make sure, one, that Rockford has a guaranteed fireworks show. Then we spend the rest of our six months leading up to the fireworks raising the rest of the funds that we possibly have to.”
Raising money for the fireworks display has never been easy. The late Joe Marino, O’Donnell’s uncle who was known as Mr. Fourth of July for his years putting on the fireworks, took out a second mortgage on his house one year when donations were low. He borrowed nearly $3,000 and paid it back over 20 years, according to Rockford Register Star archives.
“We’re not going to mortgage our houses like Uncle Joe did,” O’Donnell said. “If we get to that point, we’ll have to throw in the hat, but we don’t want to. We want to keep working our butts off for everybody.”
This year’s Festival of Lights has more than 110 displays. In addition to that there are more than 80 uplights and floodlights and about 120 twinkling trees. Several new spotlights, flood lights and twinkling trees were added this year to showcase the park during Festival of Lights.
“We added a lot more depth to the park this year,” O’Donnell said. “That park is a diamond in this city. … It’s absolutely gorgeous out there, so we wanted to accent that to show how big, No. 1, this park is and show the depth of it.”
How to donate | Festival of Lights
The Festival of Lights and Fourth of July fireworks display are both 100% funded through donations and sponsorships.
To donate, go HERE.
Find the organizations online at 4thandlights.com.
If you prefer to donate by check, you can mail to:
Rockford 4th of July Civic Committee
728 N. Prospect St., Suite 107
Rockford IL, 61107
Festival of Lights | schedule
Where: 1401 N. Second St., Rockford
Hours:
- This week: 5 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 11 through Sunday, Dec. 14
- Lead-up to Christmas: 5 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Monday, Dec. 15 and Tuesday, Dec. 16
- Christmas Eve: 24 hours
- Christmas Day: 24 hours
- Post Christmas: 5 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. Friday, Dec. 26 through Sunday, Dec. 28
- New Year’s Eve: 5 p.m. to midnight
This article is written by Kevin Haas with interviews conducted by Steve Summers for the This Week in the Stateline podcast. Email Haas at [email protected] or follow him on X at @KevinMHaas or Instagram @thekevinhaas and Threads @thekevinhaas
