Overview
America's Thanksgiving Parade features marching bands, large balloons, a variety of floats, celebrity guests, and thousands of marchers. [4] Unique to Detroit's parade are the Big Head Corps, a group of marchers wearing large papier-mâché heads caricaturing well-known figures; [5] [6] and the Distinguished Clown Corps, featuring local corporate executives and community leaders dressed as clowns. [7] [8] [9] More than 4,500 volunteers march in and staff the parade. [10] An actor playing Santa Claus rides in the last float, heralding the arrival of the Christmas season; at the end of the television broadcast, he is traditionally handed the "key to the city" by the mayor of Detroit. [11] [12]
The parade follows Woodward Avenue for its entire length. As of 2025, the parade begins at Kirby Street in Midtown Detroit, and travels southeast to its end at Congress Street in Downtown, [13] a 2.3-mile (3.7 km) route that parade units complete in roughly 90 minutes. [14] The first units step off at 8:45 a.m., and the parade usually ends around noon. [14]
Temporary grandstands are set up along the parade route for paid ticketholders, though the public may watch for free from the sidewalk. [14] As of 2025, the entire parade is televised locally and livestreamed by WDIV, from a broadcast booth near the southern end in downtown Detroit, [15] with the broadcast airing nationally in syndication from 10 to 11 a.m. [14] [16] Radio broadcasts of the parade are carried on WJR and WOMC. [17]
Street closures and setup
Woodward Avenue is closed to traffic during the parade, beginning the Wednesday before Thanksgiving to allow for setup. [14] [15] Traffic signals are removed from 20 intersections on Woodward to allow parade floats to pass without colliding. [26] [27] Due to the closure, the QLINE does not operate on Thanksgiving or the preceding Wednesday, [28] and DDOT and SMART bus routes on Woodward are detoured during the parade and setup. [29] Immediately after the parade, crews re-install the signals and sweep the street, [30] allowing Woodward to reopen by 5 p.m. on Thanksgiving Day. [14]
History
The idea came from Hudson's display director Charles Wendel after the success of the Canadian Eaton's Santa Claus Parade in Toronto, Ontario. In addition to the usual floats and bands, Wendel obtained large papier-mâché heads similar to those he saw during a recent trip to Europe. The heads are made in Viareggio, Italy, and remain a fixture of the parade to the present. [35]
The parade was suspended in 1943 and 1944 due to material shortages caused by World War II, but Hudson's resumed the event in 1945 and continued sponsorship of the parade until 1979, when the costs became burdensome. It turned the parade over to the Detroit Renaissance Foundation, who produced it for four years. In 1983, Detroit Renaissance transferred control of the parade to the newly created Michigan Thanksgiving Parade Foundation.
In 2013, the naming rights to the parade were purchased by Art Van Furniture, whose founder, Art Van Elslander, had been a longtime financial supporter of the parade. [36] Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the 2020 parade was held with no crowds. [20] [37] Beginning in 2020, Gardner-White Furniture purchased the naming rights, following Art Van's bankruptcy that year. [1]
Broadcast history
The parade was first broadcast in 1931 on radio station WWJ. [38] : 86 In 1959, the parade came to television on local stations WWJ-TV and WXYZ-TV. The WXYZ program was hosted by ventriloquist and puppeteer Shari Lewis and her sock puppet Lamb Chop and carried nationally on the ABC broadcast network. In 1960, the CBS broadcast network began to air portions of the parade and continued to do so for the next 25 parades. [38] : 121–122 After a brief break in the mid-1980s, CBS returned to cover the parade through 2002 as part of its All-American Thanksgiving Day Parade compilation show. Over the years, several other well-known personalities were commentators for the Detroit parades, including John Amos, Ned Beatty, Kathy Garver, Captain Kangaroo host Bob Keeshan, Linda Lavin, Esther Rolle and Andrew Stevens. [39]
After being broadcast on WWJ, later WDIV, for over 20 years, local coverage switched to WXYZ for several years in the 1980s before returning to NBC-affiliate WDIV in the mid-1990s. [40]
Route history
The parade has followed its current route since 2013. [36] From 2001 to 2005, it ran from Putnam Street in Midtown to Grand Circus Park downtown. [41] From 2006 to 2012, it followed the original route used in 1924, [42] from Mack Avenue to Congress Street. [43] [44] [45]
For many years, ending with Hudson's withdrawal in 1979, the parade began at Woodward and Putnam near the Detroit Public Library and ended at Hudson's Marquee near Gratiot Avenue, where Santa alighted his sleigh and received the key to the hearts of children of Detroit from the mayor. [35] In 1979, the route was moved several blocks north, beginning at Antoinette Street and ending at Adams Street, near Grand Circus Park. During this period, Santa alighted on the steps of the Detroit Institute of Arts to be welcomed by the mayor, then remounted to travel the remainder of the parade route.
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