Hometown Pride Tour: Pioneer Reunion parades

HENRIETTA, Texas (KAUZ) - Our Hometown Pride Tour continues in Henrietta on Tuesday.

On Monday, we checked out the festivities for the 91st annual Clay County Pioneer Reunion. Now, we’re taking a closer look at the parades and floats that make them spectacular.

People have been working diligently day and night to make this year’s parades even better than the last, and that begins with the floats. The crazier the better.

The 91st annual Clay County Pioneer Reunion will have food, music, rodeos and everyone’s favorite, the parades.

“We’ll have the bands, we’ll have beautiful floats,” Clay County Judge Mike Campbell said. “If you’ve never been to the Clay County Pioneer Reunion parade, your first time, the first thing you’ll say is, ‘I can’t believe they have a parade this good in such a small community.’”

“Thursday, Friday, Saturday, we have 10 a.m. parades and we have big floats and all four classes from the high school, they go full out,” Chloe O’Neal, 2021 Clay County rodeo queen, said. “They cover cars and trailers and everything like that and they follow the theme of the festivals of America. It’s something else to see. It’s crazy.”

Hometown Pride Tour: 91st Clay County Pioneer Reunion

From the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade to the Pioneer Reunion, the one thing spectators can’t get enough of are the floats.

“My favorite part about the floats is how big they get and how cool they look and last year, there was this one that was a big angel and it looked like it took a lot of time to make and it was really cool,” Ryleigh Rodrigues, 2021 Clay County rodeo princess, said.

“We got some really big floats that are, I think, as good as some perhaps in the Cotton Bowl,” Campbell said. “Maybe not the Rose Bowl, but certainly floats that children will enjoy and old folks enjoy as well. And we’ll have plenty of room for everyone, but you gotta get here early.”

The first one is the Cowboy Kickoff Parade on Thursday at 4 p.m. in downtown Henrietta. The two other parades will take place on Friday and Saturday morning at 10 a.m. Be sure to get there early and claim and good spot.

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