The line-up has been completed for Saturday’s Little Egypt Festival Parade.
The parade will step off at two from Bryan Memorial Park, south on Broadway, and then east on Main Street until it breaks up at Illinois Street.
General and Parade Chair Jay Henke is pleased with the amount of participation.
“I think the parade’s going to look really good,” Henke said. “We have a bunch of entrants, and then to add to that, a lot of them are multiple entrants. Plus, a group of side-by-side riders that will have 15 to 20 side-by-sides. Antique tractors, there will be 10 or 12 of those. Each one of those will count as a single entrant. We have a total of 94 entries.”
Henke says all parade entrants are asked not to throw candy from moving vehicles due to the risk of children running underneath a vehicle to retrieve it.
“If you could please keep your kids out of the road and away from the floats. We have instructed the floats to throw candy out to the kids so they don’t have to approach a moving vehicle. Also, if you could keep them away from the horses. I was unaware until a few weeks ago that we have instances every year where the kids approach the horses in the parade every year to pet the horses. That’s not an ideal situation, to have an animal like that in a confined area with a bunch of people around it, so we ask that everyone keep their children away from the horses as well.”
Henke says because only the length of an entry is required on the entry form, he’s not certain how many floats will be part of the parade.
There are four bands, the combined Salem High School and Grade School Band along with the Centralia Junior High, Iuka and Sandoval bands.
Henke says the committee wants to work with the Salem High School band to bring back the band field show competition that could result in more band participation.
WJBD-FM 100.1 will provide live coverage of the parade beginning around two on Saturday.
We’ll preview other activities taking place at this year’s Little Egypt Festival on Thursday.
