Good evening.

I now call to order the Wednesday, December eighteenth, two thousand twenty four meeting of the Appleton Common Council.

Please rise for the invocation, which will be delivered by Alder Furkus.

Thank you, Mayor.

Music is one of my favorite parts of this time of year.

Christmas music has been a staple, a family staple for as long as I can remember.

Whether it was my grandma's Christmas albums or the tapes and CDs my mom played through the years.

My favorite favorite Christmas song for as an adult, especially as life gets a little more hectic and busy, is O Holy Night.

There's many renditions of it that have been recorded, but it's most traditional saying that sonically fits right in at a midnight Christmas mass being sung by a choir over a pipe organ, especially with the very recognizable end of that first verse.

I like it because it's a calming sound song for a hectic time of year, but it this nearly hundred and eighty-year-old song has been a long, has had a long, strange journey to becoming a Christmas staple.

O'Holy Night's story starts in eighteen forties France when it was written to commemorate the remodeling of a church.

A local poet, Blacide Capu, wrote the lyrics and was so pleased with what he had wrote, he reached out to a friend and composer, Adolf Adam, to compose music to accompany his poem.

The end result was the song Cantique de Noel.

While the song did become popular by the standards of its time, the lyrics were seen as rather confrontational, and its sharp language around slavery in its third verse was taken as being critical of the French church.

Chains shall he break, for the slave is our brother, and in his name, all oppression shall cease.

Capu would be branded an atheist, leave the church, and later join France's socialist movement.

For his contributions, Adam would be labeled a Jew and be saddled with all the anti-Semitic baggage, this uh since sheated claim carried in the nineteenth century Europe.

It would make its way to America in the eighteen fifties, where John Sullivan Dwight would translate it to English and name his version O Holy Night.

The same lyrics that made it a praia at home made O Holy Night a popular protest song in the Abolition movement of the eighteen fifties and sixties.

An incident on Christmas Eve in 1871, though, during the Franco-Prussian War, would start to change his perception in France.

During a pause in fighting, a French soldier left his position and broke out in a rendition of Cantique de Noël.

In response, a German soldier saying, From heaven above, here I come.

Both sides would pause fighting for twenty-four hours to allow each side to celebrate Christmas.

There is still some resistance to it, but it would be part of other positive moments too, such as Reginald Fresiden's playing of it on his violin on Christmas Eve, nineteen oh six, as he became the first person to transmit voice and music through the airwaves.

The next few weeks contain many different holidays, and I hope you all get to enjoy the ones you celebrate.

Spending quality time with friends and family, enjoying good food and cherished traditions.

And after the last guest has left, or you return home from festivities, or once the kids are in bed, that you all have time to rest and relax with a book, a movie, or maybe a little music.

And may you have a peaceful and happy holidays and peace and love in the new year.

Please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance.

All are represented with the exception of Alderpersons Heffernan, Jones, and Doran, who are excused.

Roll call of officers and department heads.

And all are represented.

Okay.

On to business presented by the mayor, and uh we have a fun one to get us started.

Oh, first.

I'm so excited for the awards.

I need a motion to approve the minutes.

Thank you, Clerk Lynch.

We have a motion and a second.

Is there any discussion?

Hearing none, please cast your votes.

The motion passes 12 to zero.

The minutes have been approved.

Now for the fun stuff, I'd like to welcome uh parade committee chair Coryotis up to present the parade committee awards.

Thank you, Mr.

Mayor.

A lot of pressure when you introduce somebody saying now the fun stuff comes.

Um but it is a lot of fun, and uh we'll introduce our winners here in a couple of minutes.

I just want to say um thank you to the council and the city, uh, APD, AFD, all of the different departments that come together to really make this a special event.

On November 26th, we kicked off the holiday season with the 53rd downtown Appleton Christmas Parade.

Uh a little chillier than it has been in past years, but uh we made it through and we had a very successful event.

Last year I stood before you and I said we had 85 units and we'll never do that again.

Um this year we had 86.

So it's hard to say no.

Um, and we we had a record number of applicants, and we really had the best of the best, and the cream of the crop is here with us tonight.

Uh, I want to make sure that I thank our committee.

I want to thank WFRV, they're a very uh crucial partner in making this uh a big event, and Appleton Downtown Incorporated.

Again, uh thank you, Mr.

Mayor, the council, uh, and Sherry as well.

Sherry is your liaison to our pray committee and a strong advocate for the parades.