Lynn couple to wed on bandstand

LYNN – Best friends for 20 years, Kathy Raymond and Peter Allen decided to proclaim their love to all the world on Saturday when they take their vows on the Frederick Douglass Bandstand in Lynn Commons, with Mayor Judith Flanagan Kennedy officiating.”I want the whole world to know how much I love him. We just click,” said Raymond.Weddings have taken place on the bandstand in years past, but Raymond and Allen are making a little local history themselves by being the first couple, according to city public works clerk Sue Hefler Downey, to be married on the wood-and-stone structure since its extensive renovation last year.”This is a new thing,” said Downey.A Lynn resident since 1989, Raymond said she was partly inspired to pick the Commons as her wedding site while driving by the renovation project last year.A nutrition and food science graduate from North Shore Community College, Raymond said her long friendship with Kennedy includes working on the mayor’s political campaigns.”I’ve been with her in the rain and the cold,” Raymond said.Kennedy obtained a one-day-only authorization through Gov. Charlie Baker’s office to perform the ceremony, and Raymond and Allen followed city rules and applied for permission to get married on the Commons well in advance of their wedding.”This is absolutely the first wedding she has performed, and she is excited,” said mayoral chief of staff Jamie Cerulli.The city requires a $240 returnable deposit to use the bandstand, and in the event a city worker is required to open nearby public bathrooms or activate the electrical supply, the fee is $120 for four hours work.Requests to enter wedded bliss on city property require Board of Park Commissioners approval, and the late January commission meeting the couple was asked to attend was ill timed: Allen, a driver for Fleming Towing, had just worked an extended shifting towing cars during the first of the winter’s several blizzards.”He had been up all night,” Raymond said.The couple are inviting 90 guests to their wedding, with Raymond’s 85-year-old father, William, leading a 15-person Pennsylvania contingent. The bandstand will be decorated with roses and runner for the bride to make her entrance on.Allen, a 35-year city resident, said he appreciates the bandstand’s history. Named after the prominent 19th-century anti-slavery advocate, the bandstand is located yards away from a monument to Douglass that notes he resided in Lynn from 1841 to 1845.”The place has got history – I love it,” Allen said.The couple’s reception in the Franco-American War Veterans post is an appropriate choice: Kennedy has announced campaigns and celebrated political victories in the Western Avenue hall.