In the Beginning. . .

Norfolk Attorney and civic booster Pete Decker introduced Mermaids on Parade at a breakfast meeting with 300 business and civic leaders at Nauticus on Noember 30, 1999. He invited them to join the campaign to benefit the arts, promising that Spring 2000 would see "the most spectacular gathering of mermaids ever seen in the United States."

Sculptures would be fashioned after the logo adopted by Norfolk the year before — a free-spirited, young mermaid that signified the "new" Norfolk. The logo already adorned banners, roadsigns, buses, brochures and T-shirts.

Decker credited his wife, Bess, with hatching the idea of Mermaids on Parade during a visit to Chicago at the height of that city's Cows on Parade. Struck by the local enthusiasm - and tourist dollars - being generated by the life-size and colorful bovines, "Bess looked at me and said 'Mermaids. Mermaids in Norfolk.'"

If the inspiration came from cows, the enthusiasm Mermaids on Parade generated was strictly homegrown and the result of things unique to Hampton Roads — a strong tradition of corporate and community support for the arts, the unbridled enthusiasm of the Deckers, a history of public/private partnership capable of pulling off a major event in a short period of time, and a community ready for celebration. And the promise that at the end, an auction of mermaids would raise more money for the arts.

As the project got underway, interaction between sponsors and artists was "a pleasure to watch" according to Susan Bernard of d'Art Center, which assumed oversight of the project. And, although many sponsors initially became involved out of civic pride — they have subsequently "fallen in love with their mermaids," said Bernard.

Mermaids reflected nautical and Norfolk themes, civic pride, the diversity of the region, or whatever else artists and sponsors could dream up; a mermaid covered in coins is sponsored by a bank, a mermaid sporting a chef's hat and apron sits in front of a bakery.

Other sponsors selected schools, hospitals, recreation centers and other public areas to display their mermaids, giving their communities a close-up view of Mermaids on Parade.

As more and more sponsors came forward, the idea took off "just like kites in a wind storm" wrote Pete Decker.

Business and community leaders from neighborhoods throughout Norfolk and beyond "adopted" mermaids at $2,000 apiece. (Individual sponsors and artists could then negotiate an additional fee, depending on the complexity of the design.)

Net proceeds from the auction — online, silent and live — were shared among the Commission on the Arts and Humanities and arts organizations and charities.