Portsmouth Halloween Parade a thrill for thousands on city streets: 'It's just amazing'
PORTSMOUTH — As nighttime cloaked the city Monday night, thousands of Grim Reapers, witches, tigers, skeletons, bumble bees, Mario Kart and Scooby-Doo characters, sharks and pirates strolled through downtown, starting the city’s spookiest celebration of the year.
The 27th annual Portsmouth Halloween Parade, an October tradition that began in 1995 with just a few dozen marchers, drew crowds, first gathering at Prescott Park and then moving along city streets.
Before the clock struck 7 p.m. at the South Meetinghouse, effectively signaling the start of the parade, Jonathan Day, a parade organizer dressed as a zombified Elvis Presley, spoke of what Halloween means to him.
“This is my Christmas. I was awake at midnight and I messaged all of these ghouls, ‘Merry Christmas,’” he said of his co-marchers.
Portsmouth Thriller dance troupe members served as the parade’s co-marshals, a tradition since 2003.
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The dancers, in zombie attire, led the parade with its annual dance to the 1982 Michael Jackson hit, stomping and grunting to the beat the entire parade route. Behind them was the Leftist Marching Band and the glowstick-adorned Seacoast Ski Club, who performed a dance to “Eye of the Tiger.”
Characters from “The Nightmare Before Christmas,” bright yellow minions from the “Despicable Me” movies, and a host of "Star Wars" figures marched, too. Inflatable dinosaurs walked in tandem, and iterations of Pennywise, a Stephen King creation, were also present.
Portraying a leafy green forest creature, Candace Parker, a parade marshal and different type of “Minion,” the name of a group of parade volunteers, said she has about 18 years under her belt as a marcher.
The only “sabbatical” in her tenure came after her son was born.
“It is my absolute favorite holiday,” she said. “Hands down.”
Some of the first to arrive at Peirce Island before the parade were a handful of longtime marchers dressed as villains from the DC Comics universe. One of them was Monte Bohanan, a parade organizer who estimated the parade would feature anywhere between 1,500 to 2,000 costume-clad marchers, with another several thousand people lining the streets to witness it.
“We’ve marched in snow and sleet, and we still had a crowd,” he recalled Monday, amid unseasonably warm weather.
On a balmy evening under a crescent moon, onlookers gathered in droves, starting in Prescott Park and snaking through the heart of the city. Parade attendees sat on hills, peered downward from the illuminated Memorial Bridge and packed Market Square to take in the parade.
“I just love seeing all the costumes that people come up with,” said marcher Regan Gentner. “It’s just amazing.”
This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: Portsmouth NH Halloween Parade 2022 draws crowd of thousands
