Troy community to hold Homecoming Parade
A 73-year-old homecoming tradition is back and bigger than ever this year, thanks to the Pike County Chamber of Commerce.
The Pike County Chamber of Commerce Troy University Appreciation Day Homecoming Parade, better known as the Homecoming Parade, is a yearly event that features Troy student organizations, local business and high school bands from across Pike County and the surrounding area.
“It's just something that everybody is really looking forward to, young and old,” said Faith Byrd, the director of alumni affairs at Troy. “I think it really makes our community and our alumni feel so much more part of Homecoming Day.”
Each year, the parade is funded by local business sponsorships at $500 dollars each.
Every sponsor gets a banner to promote their business displayed by one of the high school bands in participation that year. Each high school band is then paid the $500 sponsorship bought by the business.
According to the Pike County Chamber of Commerce Homecoming Parade Chairman Dan Smith, for the past over 30 years, the parade's average band turnout has been three to five high schools. Last year, there were 12 bands in the parade, and this year there are 17 bands scheduled, marking an exponential increase from previous years.
More than 17 businesses sponsor the parade, though.
The chamber has to pay for the plaques each high school band receives for playing in the parade, and they buy tickets for all the high school band members to attend the Homecoming football game. The alumni association provides most of the tickets, but the chamber buys the rest to make sure no one is left out.
Smith said they see the event as an investment into the university and the community.
“Troy University plays such an important part in our community,” Smith said. “Obviously, it brings so many jobs and brings so much tax dollars to our community.
“We look at the parade bringing in – this year it’s 17 total bands to Troy – as a great recruiting tool for not only our future students at Troy University, but also the Sound of the South.”
The bands and banners aren’t the only thing the community sees in the parade.
Each of Troy University’s Greek organizations build, decorate and ride on floats that are eventually judged and ranked in a competition, of which the winner is announced at the football game.
It is also the first chance much of the community gets to meet the newly crowned Miss Troy University; this year’s crown-bearer being junior nursing major Gracen Murphy, from Prattville, Alabama.
“I have been looking forward to the homecoming parade since I was crowned,” Murphy said. “It’s such a sweet tradition that Miss Troy University partakes in, and I’m honored to participate this year.
“Every year it shows me how invested the greater community of Troy is in our campus, and I’m thrilled to be able to be able to take a front row seat to see it this year.”
A lot of the people at the Chamber working to organize and execute the parade each year are volunteers, not employees, including Smith.
“I know how important the event is to the university, to the Pike County Chamber of Commerce, to the city of Troy, to the community,” Smith said. “There's a lot of people involved that make it a successful and organized event, and I'm just honored to be involved with it.”
This isn’t his first year as chairmen, and it certainly isn’t his first year of involvement – that was 36 years ago. Even after all that time, Smith said the parade, the community and the culture of Troy hasn’t lost a bit of its charm.
“I believe everything has been consistent for a number of years, and I think it may be a cliche, but I know Southern hospitality is real,” Smith said. “I believe that that is what we do – we help each other.
“I know how much it meant to Mr. George O'Neill and the people that organized the parade [36 years ago], and it's something that we want to see always be successful and provide that excitement for the community.”
The Homecoming Parade this year is set for November 7 at 10 a.m. on the square in Downtown Troy.
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