Donna Cowan has announced parade since 2000
Published in the June 22 – July 5, 2016 issue of Morgan Hill Life
By Robert Airoldi
Photo by Robert Airoldi
Donna Cowan donning the traditional red Independence Day Celebration shirt in the backyard of her east Morgan Hill home.
Like many of the Freedom Fest volunteers, once Donna Cowan got involved, she really got involved. The longtime resident is one of dozens of people who help put on Morgan Hill’s week-long Independence Day Celebration events, which attracts as many as 50,000 people to the downtown.
With her years of experience in public speaking, Cowan was asked in 2000 if she might interested in helping announce Morgan Hill’s annual Fourth of July Parade entries as they went by the stage. She recruited KBAY radio personality Jona Denz-Hamilton 10 years ago to help, and found six others to announce at four different locations along the route. And at the behest of parade organizers Bob and Maureen Hunt, she organized the pre-parade entertainment that has grown throughout the years and now includes Disney characters, skits from local theater companies, bands and national anthem singers.
“We’re trying to create something like the Macy’s pre-parade show,” she said.
Every January, Donna and her husband Don join the Hunts on a trip to attend the Rose Parade in Pasadena and “that inspires us to constantly try to improve our parade,” she said.
Born in San Francisco, Donna graduated from Woodside High School in Redwood City, then the College of San Mateo before graduating with a teaching credential from California State University, Hayward. She also has a Master’s in Speech Therapy and a Master’s in Educational Leadership.
As a young woman, Cowan got involved in commercial print modeling and performed on the first infomercial with actress and spokeswoman Victoria Principal.
The couple discovered Morgan Hill by happy accident when they were traveling on a bus going to a camp at which her husband was a counselor and saw acres of rural land here. A few years later, while living in Menlo Park, Donna saw a brochure for new homes in Morgan Hill and recognized it as the place they drove past. In 1976, Don got a teaching job at Live Oak High School. A year later Donna was also hired to teach speech and English at the high school and the couple decided to make Morgan Hill their home that year, finding a lot and building a custom home here. They raised their two daughters, Laurren, who lives in Mountain View, and Heather, who lives in Morgan Hill. Both daughters have helped during the parade. Laurren can be seen as Marilyn Monroe. Heather has in the past dressed as Barbie, but won’t be in this year’s parade.
Cowan has also improved the lives of hundreds of students during her teaching career. She retired as an speech and English teacher at Live Oak High School in 2007 and continues to teach communication and public speaking at Gavilan Community College, where she’s taught since 1979. She also gets her students involved in her various volunteer activities such as local theater productions and the South Valley Wine Auction.
When they moved to Morgan Hill, about 5,000 people lived in the town and the couple loved its charm and community involvement. One of her first forays in local volunteering was with what was then called the Morgan Hill Community Theater. Today it goes by the name of South Valley Civic Theater.
“I do this because I just love it,” she said, adding that she has recruited Gavilan students to volunteer and they in turn come to love helping out. “They get involved in something larger than themselves … something more important.”
She also took acting classes as a young woman and said she was able to bring that experience to her students.
“It gave them a wonderful chance to develop themselves and gain poise and confidence,” she said. She also helped foreign exchange students in the broadcasting club she started at Live Oak High School.
Working as a Freedom Fest chair every year is a passion for Donna, especially with this year’s theme for the parade of “America, My Home Sweet Home.”
“I love this town, but it took a while,” she said. “We’re a small town still and this event unites people. It’s exciting and fun.”
