(via Dunner’s)
My very good friend VKGARRY sent me an e-mail today to let me know that the Purple Lancers of Auburn, NY is being reborn. That’s excellent news. For those of you not as well versed in your drum corps history 
, the Purple Lancers started out as a senior corps in 1949 (as most corps of that era did), with the senior corps eventually folding in 1957. However, in 1960, the Purple Lancers were revived as a junior corps and became very prominent among the many, many New York State corps of the late 60s and early 70s, winning the state’s American Legion championship in 1974 (which was a very big deal in those days) and placing tenth in the DCI Open Class finals that year. The Purple Lancers were and still are the only New York State drum corps to have ever placed in the 35 years of DCI’s Open Class/Div. I finals. (Those were the days when making the DCI finals was truly an achievement, where you had 56 other corps to compete against in the 1974 prelims to make 12 spots, compared to the measly 22 corps competing in 2007 for the same 12 spots.) And then the corps collapsed that winter, and all of us in New York drum corps were stunned.
Link: Purple Lancers Drum & Bugle Corps
of Auburn, New York, Inc.
I’ve been writing about the LACK of a New York contender Corps in the DCI activity for years. DCI never promoted much in the NYC area where I lived. Plus our director didn’t like what DCI represented. The drum corps activity is a faded echo in my community. I stopped going to DCI shows years ago. I got tired of rooting for corps that didn’t represent my state. I no longer had a hometown team. That’s a real shame that New York nevr produced another contender for DCI after the Purple Lancers. By the way, I marched with St. Rita’s Brassmen. We would had made finals easily in 72 and 73. Ihave no regrets that we didn’t go. Look wahere the activity is today. Could I have afford to march at these prices these youn adults spend today?
Jim On The Move — 4/23/2008 @ 5:44 pm
At least corps are better in todays drum corps world…
Anonymous — 7/22/2008 @ 8:43 am