Christmas Comes to Central

By Dave Freneaux 

   Last Saturday, Grand Marshalls Wayne & Diane Leader led the way down a crowded Hooper Road in the 24th annual Central Christmas Parade.  The parade, which began as an effort of the Central Area Business Association, is now sponsored each year by CABA's legacy, the City of Central Chamber of Commerce.  The bands marched and played, the Homecoming Courts sat atop fancy convertibles, and civic groups, churches, teams, clubs, dignitaries, and businesses road in festive floats and on firetrucks.  In typical South Louisiana fashion, from all of the floats, firetrucks and cars came thousands of beads, cups, frisbees, t-shirts and plastic footballs, and enough candy to keep Central's dentists busy for months.

    Unique to this year's parade was the view you see in the photo to the right.  CentralSpeaks.com positioned local photographer Mike Spangler directly above the parade route, suspended in a bucket truck for a unique view of the procession.  CentralSpeaks.com would like to thank Alvin & Casey McCloud of Armco Electric for providing the bucket truck, and Clarence & Penny Fruge of Fruge Realty for the prime parking spot for the truck right on the parade route.  All of the "arial" photographs, as well as many more taken from street level, can be seen online at CentralSpeaks.com, and the arial photos can be ordered directly from Mr. Spangler's website, ep-central.com, under the "view your pictures" tab.

     As is the custom, after the parade much of the crowd gathered at Central Middle to enjoy the carnival rides, food, and the craft show and business expo.  Awards were presented to Carrie's 5678 Dance for best performance, and to the floats of North Point Family Health (1st), JackHammer Baseball (2nd) and Cub Scout Pack 125 (3rd).  If it were possible to give the Chamber of Commerce and all of its volunteers a standing ovation in a newspaper, it would be done here and now.  At the very least, the Chamber has the thanks of an entire community for working so hard to put on one of the most memorable days of Central's year, every year.