Storm Lake students win Fourth of July art contest, join parade
Two Storm Lake Elementary artists will roll in the Big Parade after winning the 2026 Fourth of July contest. Scout Freking-Smith and Lilliana Kurr turned school art into a place in city tradition.
Scout Freking-Smith and Lilliana Kurr turned classroom creativity into a role in one of Storm Lake’s biggest summer traditions, winning the 2026 children’s art contest for the Star Spangled Spectacular and earning a ride in The Big Parade on July 4.
Scout, a second-grader in Ms. Ventura’s class at Storm Lake Elementary, won the coloring page division with a bold, colorful design. Lilliana, a fourth-grader in Ms. Hayes’s class, took top honors in the poster design category with a patriotic, anime-inspired piece. Scout is the daughter of Zach and Joanna, and Lilliana is the daughter of Marsha Yoma. Both students received gift bags from the Sugar Bowl Gift Shop.
The contest theme, “Built on Freedom. Bound by Community,” matched the message behind this year’s holiday celebration and gave the children’s artwork a direct place in Storm Lake’s civic identity. The parade ride is more than a prize. It puts the students in front of neighbors on Lakeshore Drive and links their work to a public celebration that families, schools and civic groups treat as a shared local ritual.
The Big Parade is scheduled for July 4 at 10:30 a.m. along Lakeshore Drive. Registration was free and carried a June 22 deadline, with organizers saying the parade offers participating groups a chance to present themselves to more than 10,000 spectators. The wider Star Spangled Spectacular runs July 3-4 and includes concerts, a patriotic ceremony, Artists’ Alley, street performers, a classic car cruise, food vendors and fireworks.
The contest also reflects how the Spectacular keeps building from the ground up, using children’s work to draw families into the celebration months before the first firework bursts over Storm Lake. That approach has become part of the event’s staying power. In 2025, the parade featured 99 entries, the Ride/Run drew 76 teams and Artists Alley included 28 vendors, a sign of the scale the festival has reached while still making room for the youngest artists in Buena Vista County.
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