Every Sunday morning at 8:30 this fall, a crew of volunteers has met to build new floats and fix up old ones for Saturday, October 24. The Orange County Register's Anaheim briefs put out the call for help in September, along with a contact address for anyone who wanted to pick up a paintbrush.
Those Sunday sessions say a lot about this parade. The organizers call it "a beloved hometown tradition run by local volunteers", put together each year with groups from across Anaheim to celebrate Halloween, Día de los Muertos and the harvest season. Some of the floats rolling down Broadway on Saturday night are copies of floats that rolled down the same streets about 70 years ago. Those floats only come out after dark, at 7 p.m., hours after the daytime festival closes, so the parade sets the timing for the whole day.
A tradition that never fully stopped
The festival came first. The Anaheim Fall Festival's history page says that in 1923, tired of soaped windows and pulled-up fences, the local merchants association started a Halloween festival with games and costume contests to keep kids busy. A nighttime parade was added the next year. According to PBS SoCal's Artbound, the first parade ran on October 30, 1924, with Babe Ruth as grand marshal. By the 1970s it was drawing 75,000 people, and it aired on television for a while in the 1960s.
As downtown changed, the crowds thinned. The Register reported in 2023 that the parade declined in the 1980s. When city funding ended, volunteers Sally and Frank Feldhaus kept it going. So the parade never disappeared. It got smaller.
Then two former Disney art directors, Kevin Kidney and Jody Daily, bought an 1897 Victorian in the city's historic Colony district and joined the Anaheim Historical Society. Going through old photographs, they kept finding the parade. Kidney told PBS SoCal:
"During the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s the parade was massive -- at a time it had almost 150,000 people who came from all over Southern California, out to Anaheim, out to the orange groves to stand in downtown and see the parade."
PBS SoCal dates the relaunch, built with local businesses, community members and Disney, to 2012. The Register dates the start of the revival to 2011. In 2023 the Register reported the festival's 100th anniversary and the parade's 100th edition the year after, in 2024. That makes the October 24 parade the second of its second century.
The floats are copies of the parade's own past
What Kidney and Daily brought back was the old look. PBS SoCal describes the relaunch as having a "throwback aesthetic." Its photos show the "Flying Sasser" float in the Anaheim Public Library archives from 1953 next to a 2014 replica. A "Rocket Witch" replica from the same revival years appears too. The organizer's history page still features a photo of kids crowded around the original Flying Sasser in 1953. It describes today's parade as having "community-built floats harkening back to the parade's early years."
There's an old Disney link as well. PBS SoCal notes that Disney studios worked on the Anaheim parade before Disneyland opened in 1955. Disneyland Resort is still a listed sponsor, alongside the City of Anaheim, the Anaheim Ducks and the Marconi Automotive Museum. The floats themselves still come out of those Sunday-morning sessions.
That's why the parade is worth an evening even if you've been to big theme-park parades. On Saturday, Anaheim shows off a version of itself that its own residents rebuilt from archive photos.
How Saturday is laid out
The organizer's 2026 schedule spreads the day across two spots a short walk apart.
| What | Where | When |
|---|---|---|
| Fall Festival | Center Greens, the park next to Anaheim City Hall and the Downtown Anaheim Community Center | 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. |
| Anaheim Classic Car Show | Center Street Promenade | 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. |
| Halloween Parade | Anaheim Blvd and Broadway to Broadway and West St | 7 p.m. |
Some third-party calendars list different festival hours. The times above come from the organizer's own site, anaheimfallfestival.org, and the Downtown Anaheim Association's calendar matches them for the car show. Everything is free. Car show registration is sold out, but you can still walk the rows.
The three hours between 4 and 7 decide your evening
The festival and car show wrap up at 4 p.m., and the parade doesn't start until 7. Spending that gap well is most of the planning.
Start with the route. The organizer's parade page gives it in this order:
- Start at the intersection of Anaheim Boulevard and Broadway.
- Turn left onto Center Street Promenade.
- Come back out onto Broadway.
- Finish at Broadway and West Street.
Commentary runs in both English and Spanish, with volunteer announcers. The English announcer sits at the Car Show Stage at Lemon Street and Center Street Promenade. That makes the promenade end of the route the place to hear the floats described as they pass.
Parking is where the timing gets tight. The organizer lists these options:
- Center Street Parking Garage, free, on Center Street across from the Downtown Anaheim Community Center
- Center City Parking, CarPark 3, free
- Anaheim Parking Center, CarPark 4, paid
- Anaheim High School overflow lot, opening at 5 p.m., about a 10-minute walk south to the route, aimed at people watching from Broadway
The City Hall lot is open too, but road closures mean no cars can get in or out between 3 p.m. and 9 p.m. If you park there for the festival, your car stays put until after the parade. The organizer also warns of many road closures on event day and notes that many nearby neighborhoods are permit parking only.
If you live in or near downtown, the simplest plan is to arrive by midafternoon, park once in a free garage, and stay. Catch the last hour of the car show, then pick your spot on the promenade or along Broadway before the overflow lot opens at 5 p.m. If you're driving in from Anaheim Hills or the Platinum Triangle just for the parade, the Anaheim High School lot is set up for exactly that.
What fills the lawn and the promenade before dark
The festival lineup leans toward the same handmade spirit as the floats. Acts at Center Greens include King Kukulele, the Bob Baker Marionettes, The Deadbeats, My Safe Harbor Folklorico and Rene Pompa. Over at the car show, the music lineup is The Tone Slingers, J.P. McDermott & Western Bop, Tequila Worms, and Trevor Kelly & Mr. Man.
Food vendors listed by the organizer include The Viking Truck, BBQ Skewers by Tatay Ry, The Cake Plug, Wicked Tacos, Mariscos Arenita, Kona Ice and Buttery Popcorn Co. The car show beer garden pours from Pfeiffer, Beachwood Brewing, Radiant Beer Co. and Unsung Brewing Company.
Local groups fill out the kids' side of the lawn. Activity partners include the Anaheim Public Library's STEAM Van, Muzeo, the Boys & Girls Club of Anaheim, and Wild Wing from the Anaheim Ducks. The festival also has costume contests, kids' crafts, local artists and a scavenger hunt.
Downtown keeps the season going for another week
Saturday isn't the last of it. The Thursday farmers market on Center Street Promenade becomes Nightmare on Center Street on Thursday, October 29, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m., with themed vendors, trick-or-treating and costume contests, according to the Downtown Anaheim Association. That's a second chance to wear the costume, this time at lunch.
Muzeo's "Capturing Life, Creating Character" and "AnaheimLand" exhibitions run through November 1, per the Register's Anaheim briefs. November 1 is also the first Sunday of the month, so Cars and Coffee Classics is back on the promenade from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. It's a smaller, morning version of Saturday's car show on the same block.
If Saturday leaves you wanting to help build floats for a future parade, the organizer's contact details are on anaheimfallfestival.org.
Jose Lemus brings more than 20 years of Southern California real estate experience, and knowing traditions like this parade is part of knowing a neighborhood. If you have questions about the historic blocks along the route, or you just want to talk about what's changing downtown, Salem Realty Group is a phone call away, in English or Spanish. Talk with Jose and request a free consultation.
