Super Sweet 2019 Wichita Falls 4th Of July Parade

Today is the 4th 4th of July Parade I have eye witnessed in Wichita Falls.

Clearly I must find viewing this parade an enjoyable experience.

Each year this parade seems to be bigger than the year before.

I like the high level of kid participation. Reminds me of the Burlington Berry Dairy Days Parade of my own little kid years.

And mom and dad (mostly dad) making us elaborate floats. I remember one year we were the Flintstones. I was Fred. My brother, Jake, was Wilma. Another year dad pushed sister Jackie sitting atop a giant strawberry. That may have been the last in a long line of parade floats built by mom and dad.

I saw nothing as elaborate as those Berry Dairy floats of long ago, today in Wichita Falls. Actually, no floats. But still, a lot of people having a lot of fun, parading in various ways.

The Wichita Falls 4th of July Parade starts with Airman from Sheppard Air Force Base, marching with flags representing all the nations with airman stationed in Wichita Falls.

Here we see Uncle Sam and the Statue of Liberty atop a Wichita Falls Fire and Police Museum firetruck.

And another Statue of Liberty, along with a free spirited flag waver. Now that you are making me think about it, I may have been erroneous when saying I saw no floats today. I think the above qualifies as a parade float.

I also enjoy seeing the large collection of old cars pass by, such as the pair above, with the one on the right seeming to indicate that "We could use a man like Herbert Hoover again."

And here we have a clown version of Uncle Sam, driving a jalopy with extremely active suspension.

The Uncle Sam hat you see the kid picking up, above, blew off an Uncle Sam ahead of him in the parade. I watched the hat blow down the street, following it with my camera, til I snapped the shutter when the kid picked up the hat. I did not see if the Uncle Sam hat was successfully returned to the hat-less Uncle Sam.

Above you see one of those aforementioned kids on parade, getting ready to throw some candy at me.

I particularly like the volume of candy which gets thrown out at this parade. It is like Halloween in July. Kids come prepared with bags. Today, for some reason, I got a lot of candy thrown right at me. I was a sugar magnet. I was handing candy off to other kids, and enjoying some myself. I generally do not care for candy. But this was good stuff. One of which was some sort of modern day lollipop which had what tasted like a sour blueberry at the end of the stick.

Kids doing the candy scramble.

More kids picking up the candy litter.

And now the end of the parade, slowly moving south to the celebration at Kell House.

I did the Kell House part of the celebration my first time enjoying the Wichita Falls 4th of July Parade. Because that time I watched the parade from a vantage point near Kell House, sitting where there was no shade. The following years the parade viewing has taken place at a much shadier location at the heart of downtown, near the start of the parade.

One of the things I like about Wichita Falls is the ease of attending something, like a parade, or the Hotter 'n Hell events in August at the nearby by MPEC location. It takes about five minutes to get from my home location to downtown Wichita Falls, with zero problem finding a place to park, such as today, parking in the library parking lot.

One of the things missing from the Wichita Falls 4th of July Parade, which I have enjoyed at all other 4th of July Parades I have eye witnessed, as in the Arlington and Granbury 4th parades in Texas, and the Sedro-Woolley Loggerodeo 4th of July Parade in Washington, is local high school participation.

All the multiple Arlington high school's marching bands participate, along with the cheerleaders, and other high school groups.

My one and only time viewing the Granbury 4th parade the high school band participated, along with the cheerleaders. And the high school football team. I long ago webpaged my one and only time watching the Granbury 4th of July Parade. I will go see if I can find the link to it. If you see the link turned on, this indicates my parade search was successful.

Hope the 4th of July is fun and safe for everyone.

And see you all next year in downtown Wichita Falls, on this day, for the 2020 Wichita Falls 4th of July Parade. Which I suspect will be the best ever. Maybe with a high school marching band...