I met the dynamic and charming Readon (Donnie) Marilyn Grossi Silva several years ago at the Lompoc Valley Historical Society, where she was working as one of the volunteers who lovingly tend to the area’s history. Born in Lompoc on December 7, 1933, Donnie’s childhood home was on Santa Lucia Canyon Road, and she has lived in Lompoc all her life.
I had heard that she was Lompoc’s first Flower Festival Queen back in 1954, and I was hoping she might share some memories with me. She was constantly in motion, but I followed her around and did my best to ask her questions.
It wasn’t hard to picture Donnie as a festival queen, looking pretty in a fancy dress, wearing a flower crown, and waving from a float. She earned the title by selling the most tickets to the festival, and her vivacious personality, still very much in evidence, must have served her well. “We went up and down the streets, hounding people, begging them to death to buy the tickets,” she recalled. She probably sold thousands.