Town Official Post: It Was ‘So Much Fun’ Last Year ‘We Just Had To Do It Again’

The morning of Saturday, July 25, 2026, at the Gazebo-anchored Downtown Front Royal community park, the now-annual Front Royal Pride Day celebration kicked off at 10 a.m. Of that kickoff, the Front Royal Town website observed: “We had so much fun celebrating love and PRIDE with you all last year; we just had to do it again! Join @frprideva at the Main Street, Front Royal Gazebo on Saturday, July 26, 2025, for a community celebration with music, vendors, food trucks, and of course — DRAG! This is a free event, and is open to EVERYONE who wants to celebrate the community.”

Graphic advertising Front Royal Pride Day 2026 celebration. Royal Examiner Photos Roger Bianchini

And in the crowd that built steadily from late morning to 4 p.m. that afternoon, those adults present appeared to represent, not only the gay lifestyle, but heterosexuality and perhaps even a touch of asexuality as well.

As observed last year, a perhaps unifying trait among those present appeared to be a sense of humor. And that humor was presented in two rounds of “Performance” slots, totaling 19, though some of the “drag” performers had shots in both rounds.

Those multiple appearance performers included “Performance” Host Ava V. Rage.

FRPride President Izzy France alerts the early crowd of the pending official opening of 2026 event. Present with France, but obscured in photo is FRPride Vice-President Rae Spangler. Below is event ‘Performance’ HOST Ava v. Rage, who opened things with a ‘Mayhem Mix’.

In introducing Rage, it was noted that she is based out of New York City. And from an online search of Pride Day, it would seem such a base of operations was appropriate. An online search produced this “AI Overview/Wikipedia” history lesson: “The organized pursuit of LGBTQ rights in the United States reaches back to at least 1924 and the founding of the Society of Human Rights in Chicago by Henry Gerber.

“But the event that catalyzed the LGBTQ rights movement came in June 1969 in New York City’s Greenwich Village, at the Stonewall Inn. In the early morning hours of June 28, police raided this popular gathering place for young members of the LGBTQ community — arresting the employees for selling liquor without a license, roughing up many of the patrons, and clearing the bar … Before long, some 400 people were rioting. Although police reinforcements dispersed the crowd, riots waxed and waned outside the bar for the next five days, and these Stonewall riots (also called the Stonewall uprising) provided the spark that ignited the LGBTQ rights movement in the United States.”

A vendor display of gay rights and gay pride items.

And while there was no riot apparent in Saturday’s FRPride-sponsored event, many of the drag performances featuring musical lip-synching, an occasional actual “Performance” vocal, and the spectacular cross-dressing characteristic of that growing professional comedy circuit, many of those performances were riotously funny.

So, we will conclude with some crowd and event photos, trying to catch the positive and sometimes hilarious mood of FRPride 2026:

Several shots of the crowd gathering for the first of two ‘Performance’ sections of the Pride Day events. And finally, below, making time to shop the vendor booths.

Two performance shots: the first gets a bit wavy; the second features a sign to the left reading ‘No Kings but Drag Kings’.

Sponsors were acknowledged by grateful FRPride Day organizers. In addition to equal rights for alternative sexual lifestyles, included among the goals of Pride Day nationwide, noted on Wikipedia, are “equal rights and safety for all people” and an “honoring of people lost to hate crimes and the HIV/AIDS.”