Mummers Parade 2023

The annual Mummers Parade traces itself as the oldest continuous folk parade held in the U.S., dating back 100 years or more before its first officially ...

“You have to get your artists and your designers to draw pictures of costumes and characters so that you can start to develop the process. The pandemic had also made it difficult for Mummers to gather — which they need to do within a week of the parade to start planning the next year’s theme. The Mummers also found a new sponsor and partner in Live! Brown said there is also a lot more diversity to the parade than in the past as women and people of color now participate. Sammy Regalbuto, president of the Philadelphia Mummers String Band Association, and a vice president of Quaker City said the divisions have been training with the city. Maita Soukup, a spokeswoman for the Philadelphia Department of Parks and Recreation, said the clubs “receive training in understanding cultural appropriation, rules of satire, LGBTQ cultural competence, and bias awareness. A new TV contract to air the parade on WDPN-TV (MeTV2) is part of that direction, he said. The museum contains a collection of costumes, oral histories, video and audio archives, an instructional exhibit for the famed strut, and a gift shop. The start of last year’s parade was delayed a day because of rain, and a resurgent COVID-19 pandemic reduced the number of participants and spectators. It was the first Mummers Parade for Christine Calenza, 31, of Conshohocken, and she held a sign proudly declaring so. The 10,000 or so participating mummers are organized by clubs in one of four divisions: Comic, Fancy, Wench, and String Band. The parade was paused while crews “rewired” everything, he said.