Gavarone said Vance was introduced by his mother, Beverly Aikins, who celebrated her 10-year anniversary of her sobriety at the event, which was held a day before her birthday.
“The ball was fantastic,” Charters said. “Everybody was dressed to the nines and everybody was very positive ... and looking forward to the next four years under new leadership in America.”
Charters said he and his daughter watched the inauguration Monday with other Ohioans at a restaurant. “That was great,” he said. “It was like we were almost there. People were clapping and cheering and very enthusiastic.”
The Liberty Ball on Monday evening, one of three inaugural balls Trump attended that day, also was a highlight for Charters and Gavarone, as the father-daughter duo got to see the president and First Lady Melania Trump, plus Vance and his wife, Usha, and meet various politicians.
“This was all new to me,” Charters said. “I never been to anything like this before. I met a lot of people ... and it was really a thrill for me to be there and experience this once-in-a-lifetime experience.”
Gavarone, an Alter High School graduate, said the energy in the room at the ball was “just electric.” “People were so excited for the next four years,” she said.
Zach Stacy of Monroe, who drove to Washington D.C. with his wife, a teacher for Middletown City schools, said that being a Middletown native, he felt it was “extremely important” to be in the nation’s capital to support Trump and Vance’s win.
“This is not only a great honor for Ohio, but it’s a huge victory for Middletown,” he said.
The couple said they made it into the “victory rally” at Capitol One Arena the night before the inauguration.
“JD shares a similar story to a lot of us in Middletown, and it was just good to be in the moment and experience that, so seeing Trump and the vice president, that was a big deal for us,” Stacy said. “We weren’t there to celebrity watch. I think a lot of people around us were.”
But on Monday, with Washington, D.C. being essentially shut down for Trump’s inauguration, they chose to go to a club and watch the ceremonies from there.
“The entire weekend was the experience,” Stacy said. “Being in D.C. for something like that is something everybody should experience.
“It was nice to feel like you’re a part of history.”
Monday marked the first inauguration Frank Jenks ever attended, and something the Enon resident started to plan for as soon as Trump won in November.
He said he drove with friends, but the weather came as “a big disappointment.”
“I had actually gotten tickets for the Capitol Lawn on Monday from Rep. Mike Turner, but once it was moved inside there was no way I could get into the arena with the extremely limited seating,” he said.
The best part of being in Washington, D.C. was getting to see the large amounts of people who came out to support Trump, Jenks said.
“When I’m online, I tend to get the impression that everyone is against him and it’s nice to talk to real people and see that there are actually other people that think like me,” he said.
Laura Rosenberger, of Clark County’s Green Twp., said she and her husband did “every event that we could,” with their favorite ones being those put on by the Ohio Republican Party, including its inaugural ball.
Rosenberger, who represents Clark, Clinton and Greene counties as State Central Committee Woman, District 10, and is the executive chairman of the Clark County Republican Party, said the most amazing part was setting out after the event to try and find the end of the line for the Trump rally.
“We walked for forever, for two or three hours, for quite a few miles, and we gave up. We never found the end of the line,” she said. “That was really mind boggling to see that many people.”
Sunday night, the couple got dressed in formal attire to attend the Liberty Ball at the Walter E. Washington Convention Center, one of three inaugural balls that evening, which Rosenberger said was “outstanding” and featured performances by country music singer Jason Aldean and the United States Air Force Band of Flight, which is stationed at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base.
On Monday, the couple was out the door by 5 a.m. because they wanted to get into the inauguration viewing at Capitol One Arena, a six-hour endeavor between walking and waiting in line.
“That was a great event and it was so much better than actually being at the Capitol,” Rosenberger said. “They made the right move, moving it indoors ... because we were able to see it better because in the arena they have all the huge screens, but at the same time they had down on the floor live events going on.”
“You got to see the President take his oath ... (at) the Capitol up on the big screen, and you can’t really see that if you’re just outside at the Capitol ... and you got to sit there. They had seats for everybody.”
In addition, numerous speakers came through, including billionaire businessman Elon Musk and then President Trump himself at 4:40 p.m. The Rosenbergers got to see Trump again at 11:30 p.m. at the Liberty Ball.
All in all, “everything worked out great,” Rosenberger said. “Everybody was very positive and excited, and there weren’t any problems,” she said.
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