The longtime favorite will feature a shortened route from 51st Street to 55th Street after it was canceled last year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Bud Billiken is back.
After a year hiatus due to the pandemic, the parade will return to the South Side for the 92nd time on Saturday, Aug. 14. The typically annual event attracts tens of thousands of spectators and marchers to Washington Park.
The parade route will be shorter, though, starting at 51st Street and continuing to 55th Street, rather than launching from 39th as it has been in the past. The route has been shortened in hopes of limiting crowds, said Antawn Anderson, executive administrator and program director of the Bud Billiken Parade.
The number of parade performers, including dance troops and bands, will also be cut in half due to COVID-19 safety precautions.
But bringing back the event will restore a tradition featuring dances and performances that generations of South Siders and others have enjoyed.
“It’s more than a parade, and it’s more than one day,” Anderson said. “Individual leaders and dance directors put their lives into these children. And the reality is, in our community, dance saves lives.”
At the parade’s end, the annual free community festival is set to take place from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
Anderson estimates that about 70 to 80 percent of previous sponsors will return for this year’s event. In the past donors have given out free school supplies and back-to-school haircuts, among other goods and services.
Bud Billiken’s broadcasting partner, ABC7, is scheduled to pretape the dance performances that morning.
Anderson hopes the return will create memories for another crop of youngsters and adults who lost out last year — like Bud Billiken has done for many families in years past.
“My mom was a candy lady,” recalled Anderson, who has attended the parade since he was 5. “She would sell chips, candy and juices along the parade route. I was always out there with her setting up early and watching the parade.”
More information about the parade for performers, sponsors and parade-goers can be found at www.budbillikenparade.org.
from Chicago Sun-Times - All https://ift.tt/2RkYdKL
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