Members of the Old Crowd marching band lead the Old Crowd parade down Main Street in Mount Clemens on Aug. 21.
By: Dean Vaglia | Mount Clemens-Clinton-Harrison Journal | Published August 22, 2025
MOUNT CLEMENS — At the sounding of a whistle shortly after 9 a.m. on Aug. 21, the denizens of Mount Clemens were awoken by the thundering drums and trumpeting horns of one of Macomb County’s oldest traditions, marching through the city’s streets.
The Old Crowd, a group of 240 men that have been assembling every August in the county seat since 1880, gathered and set off for its 145th day of festivities. The first meeting of the group occurred as four former residents of Mount Clemens were looking for a way to reconnect as they began moving into the surrounding townships and elsewhere in the state.
“The founding fathers … were members of the community here, and they saw that in 1880 already people were moving away into the nether regions of Macomb County,” Old Crowd Vice Chairman Paul Berger said. “So, what they tried to do is they tried to have a reunion; get everybody together and invite everyone in.”
Functionally speaking, not much has changed since the original meeting nearly a century and a half ago. The itinerary for the day begins with a brass band and a parade through Mount Clemens, starting at the Macomb County Circuit Court, looping around Walnut Street and Macomb Place before marching down to the YMCA next to MacArthur Park. From there, members embark on boats or travel by other means to Lake St. Clair Metropark for a full day of three meals, fishing, cooking and camaraderie.
“We eat three meals a day, a big band’s there, have a couple beers and we go home,” Old Crowd President Mac MacCarroll said.
Many of the changes that have occurred within the Old Crowd have come down to balancing the new with the old. What was once an event held under a single tent has since evolved to multiple tents. Most of the cooking has been moved to catering due to ordinance shifting, though the frying of fish and boiling of corn cobs remain an on-site special. Bands still play for the congregating members, even as the location of the Old Crowd’s meetup has changed from Conger Bay to MacRay Harbor to Lake St. Clair Metropark. At one point, a double decker boat carried the Old Crowd out to their gathering spot, though the ship has since traded the Clinton River for the Chicago River, leaving members of the crowd to embark on private ships should they choose to sail.
Membership rules are heavily steeped in tradition. The 240-maximum number for members has been set since the 1900s and membership really only opens up when an existing member dies or becomes a life member. New members can apply starting at age 35 with children of current members getting the chance to apply early starting at age 30. One notable membership tradition is that Old Crowd members must be men, with Berger saying there were “too many problems” on the two occasions women were allowed in. Berger claims this exclusion was one of the contributing factors that led to the creation of the women-only Daughters of Macomb organization, which itself meets annually in August.
Much like the activities themselves remaining mostly unchanged since the late 1800s, so too does the purpose of reconnecting with old friends and acquaintances. Macomb County Executive Mark Hackel, an Old Crowd member since the early 2000s, demonstrated this by catching up with former law enforcement friend and current St. Clair County Magistrate Dennis Rickert prior to the parade’s start.
“It really is kind of a unique thing,” Hackel said. “Really no purpose behind it other than bringing people together. It’s almost like a reunion of sorts, like a high school reunion but we didn’t go to school together. We all connected somehow through civic and community events and just being around the Mount Clemens area.”
With membership being a tightly controlled thing and the waiting list remaining long, Berger believes the Old Crowd will last much, much longer than the next 145 years.
“Hopefully it will keep on going forever and ever, amen,” Berger said. “There are enough people that are applying on a regular basis, we’re constantly getting new members to fill in and we’re also making sure that there’s people that are invested in the thing so that we have the core group that puts the whole thing on … So long as we have a good core group, I think it’ll be around for a while.”