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Paul Friday

The Coloma Class of 1959 would like to submit Paul Friday for the "Distinguished Alumni" recognition award through the Coloma Community Schools.


Paul Friday has made many  contributions to farming production and community growth.  He has brought a tremendous amount of recognition to Coloma, to Berrien County, to Michigan and the Guinness Book of World Records.

In 1977, Paul suggested to city officials to rename what was the Gladiolus Festival to become what is currently the Glad Peach Festival.  He worked with city officials and the festival was renamed and has continued to grow and bring many tourists and locals together to the community of Coloma for the many activities associated with the expanded Glad Peach Festival.  This enhanced the immediate agriculture industry for the community of Coloma and surrounding areas.  The first parade after this change was filled with agricultural machines.  Paul recruited Jerry Scheffler to line up some local farmers to be in the parade with farm equipment.  They made an excellent demonstration of the agriculture industry in the Coloma area.

Paul is a Coloma peach grower and developed a successful peach breeding program of the Flamin' Fury peach varieties.  This is recognized around the world.  He has a catalog that offers all the varieties of the Flamin' Fury peach trees.

Paul accomplished growing the largest peach in the world in 2002 and is listed in the 2002 Guinness Book of World  Records. The world record was broken again by Paul in 2005.  He presented a beautiful peach weighing 30.5 ounces.  This was his Flamin' Fury PF-24-007 variety.   More information regarding the history and development of Flamin' Fury and Paul is on the web site:  flaminfury.com

Paul has contributed to and served in many local service groups and organizations for many years.  He is proud of assisting in the existence of the beautiful Randall Park.  This is just one of many activities he assisted in wholeheartedly.