SkullandChains Report This Comment Date: May 16, 2010 09:26PM
STURTEVANT — Sara Jozefowski found herself in the back of a hearse Saturday
night.
The 18-year-old Park High School student was not headed to a funeral though. She
was going to prom.
Along with five friends from Park, Jozefowski rode in a restored, antique hearse
on the way to the school’s prom. They also rode in the hearse in the parade
procession that led students at eight Racine-area high schools from their
individual school proms Saturday evening to the Racine Downtown Rotary Club’s
annual all-school Post Prom celebration Saturday night.
The parade to Post Prom has become notorious for the crazy and out of the
ordinary rides students choose, attempting to outdo each other. Past promgoers
have taken fire trucks, buses, classic cars and even an elephant, though animals
are now banned.
“I think everyone just wants to ride in something really cool to have the best
car and have something different,” Jozefowski said, which is why she and her
friends went in the hearse. “We just thought it was really different and would
be fun.”
Jozefowski got the idea to arrive in a hearse from her mom, who works with a
woman whose boyfriend, Chris Friend, just finished fixing up the antique hearse
for car shows. When Friend, 34, of Racine, heard about the idea for him to drive
the students to prom and Post Prom in his hearse, he was thrilled.
“I don’t think it’s been done before,” said Friend, who went to high
school in Racine and knows about the desire for unique prom transportation.
And the hearse certainly fit the unique transportation category. Complete with
30-inch tire rims and skull detailing on the rearview mirrors, the 1984 Cadillac
hearse and its pearl blue paint job gleamed when Friend picked the students up
Saturday from Jozefowski’s house in the 8500 block of Westbrook Drive.
“I didn’t expect it to have the rims and little skeletons but that’s
pretty cool,” said Donovan Senzig, an 18-year-old Park senior who rode to prom
in the hearse.
After posing for group pictures in front of the hearse, Senzig, Jozefowski and
the other students climbed in the hearse’s back and front seat one by one, the
girls carefully maneuvering to avoid snagging dresses or wrecking high
heels.
While riding in the back of a hearse may sound morbid to some, Jozefowski said
it doesn’t bother her or her friends.
“There’s no bodies in there now and he keeps it clean,” Jozefowski said of
the hearse, which is not used to transport the deceased anymore. “I don’t
think it’s really too scary.”