50 Fun Facts About Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade

Which silent-film cartoon star became the first character balloon in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1927?

Felix the Cat was designed by the store's own window-display artist, and character balloons soon replaced live animals as the parade's signature attraction.

What did Macy's do with its giant balloons after each Thanksgiving Day Parade from 1928 to 1932?

Macy's released them into the sky to leak slowly and drift back down over about a week, with a reward for whoever found one. A near plane crash ended the stunt.

Although it was held on Thanksgiving morning, Macy's first parade in 1924 was named after which other holiday?

Christmas was the point: the store wanted to whet shoppers' appetites for the gift-buying season and show off its newly expanded, block-long flagship.

Which figure, crowned "King of the Kiddies" at the first Macy's Parade in 1924, still closes the procession every year?

Santa Claus was enthroned above the store entrance in 1924 and has brought up the rear ever since, apart from one parade in the early 1930s that he led instead.

Which children's TV character's balloon was knifed and stomped flat by police during the windy 1997 Macy's Parade?

Barney was punctured by a lamppost and crashed onto his handlers, and officers finished the job with knives and boots as the crowd cheered.

In the first Thanksgiving episode of Friends, which Macy's Parade balloon breaks loose and drifts over New York City?

Underdog gave the 1994 episode its title, although the real balloon of the caped cartoon dog was no longer flying in the parade when it aired.

Which 1947 holiday classic opens with the Macy's Parade, using footage shot at the real 1946 event?

Miracle on 34th Street filmed the real 1946 parade with nine cameras at once, and its plot begins when the store's hired parade performer turns up drunk.

Which 1980s British pop star pranked the 2008 Macy's Parade by bursting into song from a cartoon float?

Rick Astley interrupted the Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends float with his 1987 hit, a live "rickroll" seen by millions that carried the joke into the mainstream.

Which lighter-than-air gas has kept the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons aloft since the late 1920s?

Helium was in such demand for the war effort in the 1940s that it was one reason the parade was called off for three years running.

Which marionette master, hired for Macy's window displays, designed the Thanksgiving parade's first giant balloons?

Tony Sarg, billed as America's Puppet Master, dreamed up the giant tethered animal balloons for the store, and his protégé Bil Baird built them.

Which Ohio tire maker built the giant balloons for the Macy's Parade from the 1920s until 1980?

Goodyear, the company behind the famous blimp, turned out the parade's balloons in Akron for more than half a century.

Which television network has been the official broadcaster of the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade since 1953?

NBC has held the official rights since 1953, five years after CBS carried the parade's first network telecast.

At which Manhattan intersection, home to the Macy's flagship store, does the Thanksgiving Day Parade finish?

Herald Square has been the finish since 1924, and the final blocks are closed to spectators because they are reserved for the television broadcast.

Which rival department store staged America's oldest Thanksgiving parade in 1920, four years before Macy's first?

Gimbels sent about 50 costumed employees through Philadelphia in 1920 and kept sponsoring that parade until the chain was liquidated in 1986.

Which Midwestern city launched its own Thanksgiving parade in 1924, the same year Macy's first marched in New York?

Detroit's parade was started by the Hudson's department store, whose display director had admired a holiday parade in Toronto; its first edition had ten floats.

Which video game hero's balloon hit a lamppost in 1993, the year it became gaming's first Macy's Parade character?

Sonic was shoved by strong gusts into a lamppost at Columbus Circle on his debut, injuring a child and an off-duty police officer.

Which Dr. Seuss character's balloon knocked down a lamppost arm in 1997, leaving a Macy's Parade spectator in a coma?

The Cat in the Hat, six stories tall, struck the lamppost twice in gusts topping 40 mph; the injured woman was in a coma for 24 days and balloons that size were banned.

Which New York mayor ordered a balloon-safety task force after high winds wrecked the 1997 Macy's Parade?

Rudy Giuliani's task force brought in size limits for balloons, lampposts stripped of their arms and fitness tests for the volunteer handlers.

Macy's canceled three wartime Thanksgiving parades in the 1940s because the war effort needed which balloon material?

Rubber was too precious to spend on balloons, so the parade went dark from 1942 to 1944 and returned in 1945.

Which dance troupe, famous for its eye-high kickline, has performed at every Macy's Parade since 1957?

The Rockettes started out in 1925 as the Missouri Rockets, and at the parade they traditionally dance just before the procession itself arrives.

Since the 1960s, what have most singers on Macy's Parade floats done instead of performing live?

Most have lip-synced to recordings since 1964, because singing into a wireless microphone on a moving float kept going wrong. The microphones they hold are usually props.

Which children's show sent its cast to lead the 2019 Macy's Parade in honor of its 50th anniversary?

Sesame Street took the place of the New York police motorcycle patrol, which has traditionally ridden at the front of the parade since 1985.

Which annual canine competition has been televised straight after the Macy's Parade since 2002?

The National Dog Show is the Kennel Club of Philadelphia's event, which dates from 1879 and was renamed when it took the Thanksgiving slot.

Which Today weatherman joined the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade telecast in 1995 as its ribbon-cutting host?

Al Roker's first absence came in 2022, when he was recovering from blood clots and the broadcast was hosted entirely by women for the first time.

Which Disney character first floated down the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade route as a giant balloon in 1934?

Mickey Mouse joined a parade that had drawn crowds of more than a million the year before and that, one newspaper reported in 1934, took an hour to pass.

On Seinfeld, Elaine wins her boss Mr. Pitt a chance to hold the ropes of which Macy's Parade balloon?

Woody Woodpecker gets popped when Jerry knocks a pointy trophy out of a window above the route. The real balloon was a parade staple from 1982 to 1996.

Which Peanuts character joined the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 1968 dressed as a World War I Flying Ace?

Snoopy had taken up his Flying Ace persona in the comic strip only three years earlier, forever being shot down by his imaginary rival, the Red Baron.

Which member of The Simpsons family debuted as a Macy's Parade balloon in 1990, on the day an episode joked about it?

Bart drifts past on the family's television just as Homer grumbles that passing-fad cartoon characters should never be turned into balloons.

Which Muppet, created by Jim Henson in 1955, first appeared as a Macy's Parade balloon in 1977?

Kermit began life as a puppet cut from a discarded turquoise coat belonging to Henson's mother, with two halves of a ping-pong ball for eyes.

Macy's employees who staged the first Thanksgiving parade in 1924 were mostly immigrants from which continent?

Europe had been home for most of the store's staff, and their costumed march was such a hit that Macy's declared it an annual event.

Which Florida resort began staging a daily holiday parade with Macy's Parade balloons and floats in 2002?

Universal Orlando shares a parent company with the parade's official broadcaster, and its seasonal parade borrows balloons and floats from the New York original.

Which punk rock band included a song called Macy's Day Parade on its 2000 album Warning?

Green Day borrowed the event's everyday nickname for the title of a folk-tinged track on Warning, which Reprise Records issued that October.

Which 2016 film reboot has its heroes fight a parade of sinister Macy's balloons from the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s?

Ghostbusters built real giant balloons on set to stand in for the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man balloon that joins its haunted procession.

Which 2011 Ben Stiller comedy has its climax during the Macy's Parade, restaged a week later for filming?

Tower Heist grew out of an idea for a caper about robbing Trump International Hotel and Tower, and its crew filmed parts of the real parade as it happened.

Which cartoon duo heckled the 1997 Macy's Parade from their couch in a special hosted by Kurt Loder?

Beavis and Butt-Head even got a balloon of themselves on a couch, but it sat on a rooftop beside the route and never flew in the parade itself.

Which Nickelodeon cartoon gave the Macy's Parade its first three-character balloon in 1997?

Rugrats put Tommy Pickles, Chuckie and Spike on a single balloon, one of four newcomers that year alongside a Swedish cow named Bumpé.

Which Spanish-language network began simulcasting the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade in 2003?

Telemundo's first four broadcasts were fronted by María Celeste Arrarás, the anchor of its newsmagazine Al Rojo Vivo.

What pulled the giant balloons through the crowd-free 2020 Macy's Parade in place of human handlers?

Specialty vehicles, five to a rig, anchored each balloon in a parade staged for television only, with 88% fewer participants because of COVID-19.

In which Manhattan neighborhood did the first Macy's Parade set off in 1924, six miles from the store?

Harlem's 145th Street was the starting line, and the six-mile march of 1924 has since been cut to a route of about two and a half miles.

Which Broadway musical played the 2007 Macy's Parade in logo shirts with makeshift props during a stagehands' strike?

Legally Blonde was the only one of that year's four performing shows whose theater was shut by the walkout, so its cast went on with no sets at all.

Which Broadway musical's number at the 2018 Macy's Parade featured the telecast's first same-sex kiss?

The Prom follows a student barred from bringing her girlfriend to a school dance, and its leads Caitlin Kinnunen and Isabelle McCalla shared the kiss.

Which swing-era clarinetist's sextet gave the Macy's Parade its first celebrity performance in 1958?

Benny Goodman, the bandleader known as the King of Swing, opened the door to the star turns that now fill the parade's floats.

Which older New York Thanksgiving custom, in which costumed children begged door to door, faded as Macy's parade grew?

Ragamuffin Day had sent children out dressed as beggars since about 1870, and New York's last Thanksgiving ragamuffin parade was held in 1956.

In the 1930s, Macy's Thanksgiving balloons had to be hauled down low to pass beneath what on Columbus Avenue?

An elevated railway, the Ninth Avenue El, crossed the route of those parades, which then set off from near the Cathedral of Saint John the Divine.

Which thoroughfare took the Macy's Parade south from Central Park when a 2012 rerouting dropped Times Square?

Sixth Avenue replaced the Seventh Avenue leg through Times Square; Broadway, the parade's home for decades, had already been cut from the route in 2009.

What does the Macy's Parade call a unit that is half float and half balloon, seven of which rolled in 1997?

Falloon blends the two words, and that year's newcomers included the World of Wiggle, sponsored by a gelatin dessert brand.

Which artist's giant metallic Rabbit floated as a balloon in the 2007 Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade?

Jeff Koons's bunny flew in the Blue Sky Gallery, the series that since 2005 has turned contemporary artists' works into full-size balloons.

Which entertainer nicknamed Banjo Eyes became one of the very few real people ever turned into a Macy's Parade balloon?

Eddie Cantor earned the nickname with his eye-rolling song-and-dance routines, and caricaturists drew his eyes as round as a banjo's drum.

The Rangerettes, Macy's Parade regulars and the world's first women's precision drill team, hail from which state?

Texas is home to Kilgore College, whose Rangerettes were created in 1940 and have also danced at five presidential inaugurations.

Which Bonanza star co-hosted the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade telecast for nearly a decade, starting in 1963?

Lorne Greene was playing ranch patriarch Ben Cartwright on the Western at the time, and he shared the parade hosting desk with Betty White.