August 27, 2025
Introduction: In this article – in honor of the upcoming Labor Day parades – Melissa Davenport Berry shows some of our ancestors’ floats from past parades. Melissa is a genealogist who has a website, americana-archives.com, and a Facebook group, New England Family Genealogy and History.
To mark Labor Day this year, I conducted research using GenealogyBank’s Historical Newspaper Archives and some special photo collections to examine past Labor Day parade floats from various regions of the United States.
1905: Millmen’s Float Wins First Prize in Parade in San Jose, California
This headline reads:
Typified Planing Mill on a Small Scale, and Was Adjudged to Be Most Beautiful Float in Parade. Success of Float Was Due to the Efforts of a Committee, of Which W. J. Power Was the Chairman.
1910: Railroad Machinists’ Float, Labor Day Parade, Texas
Here is a newspaper clip describing Labor Day festivities in the town of Tyler, Texas, in 1910.
This article reports:
Tyler, Tex., Sept. 6 – Between 3,000 and 3,500 visitors from nearby towns were here yesterday to participate in Labor Day festivities. The Cotton Belt general offices, machine shops, banks, and post office closed, and in the afternoon many of the stores. At 11 o’clock there was a parade, made up of a great line of decorated floats, most of which represented the various labor organizations. The parade was formed at the City Hall and, headed by Chief of Police Burgess and led by the Tyler Kid Band, marched around the court square and through the principal streets out to Whitakers Park, where the program of the day was carried out.
The principal speaker of the day was Hon. William D. Williams of Fort Worth, Railroad Commissioner.
In the afternoon at Maxwell Park there was a game of ball between the Cotton Belt team and the Jacksonville nine.
Excursion trains were run from Lufkin, Corsicana, and Mount Pleasant.
1912: Laundry Workers International Union, Seattle, Glee Club Float, Labor Day, Seattle, Washington
1929: Stork Mini-Float Wins First Prize in Children’s Parade in Seattle, Washington
This photo caption reads:
The Prize-Winning Float at South Park’s Labor Day Celebration: Mary Agnes Richardson
Among many artistic ensembles entered in the children’s parade this one, piloted by the 6-year-old daughter of Dr. and Mrs. J. W. Richardson, 4863 10th Ave S., [Seattle, Washington], was awarded first honors by the judges.
1932: Stars and Stripes and an ‘Old-Timer’ Come to Town, Washington, D.C.
The two photo captions read:
The Betsy Ross float (left), one of the prize winners among the many beautiful and elaborate floats in the firemen and policemen’s Labor Day parade. It won second prize for No. 31 engine company. [Note: On 14 June 1777, Congress officially adopted the Stars and Stripes as the national flag.]
An old-timer (right) comes to town. Dating back to 1741, this old hand-pumper won first prize as the oldest piece of fire apparatus in the Labor Day parade. It was entered by Reserve Hose Company No. 1 of Greencastle, Pa.
1937: American Indian Actors on the Screen Actors Guild Float in Los Angeles, California
Other Labor Day Floats from the Archives
Here’s an early 1900s farming family ready for the Labor Day parade in Alamosa, Colorado. Their coach has been decorated with sheaves of wheat, an eagle, and a flag.
From the 1930 Labor Day parade in Las Vegas, Neveda, comes this “Standard-Merc. Furniture” float.
American fighting spirit in WWII is reflected in this float from 1942.
Happy Labor Day!!!
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Note on the header image: International Brotherhood of Painters and Allied Trades Local 30 horse-drawn parade float, Labor Day, Savanah, Georgia, 1900. Credit: Silverstein’s Studio; Southern Labor Archives, Georgia State University Library.