Yankee Homecoming adding some muscle cars to parade

Sep 20, 2023

A row of classic cars as seen at the recent Olde Fashioned Sunday.

NEWBURYPORT — Cars & Coffee is joining forces with Yankee Homecoming for the 65th annual parade on Sunday as parade organizers recently put out the call for antique and specialty cars owners to join the fun.

The informal Cars & Coffee car show meets behind the McDonald’s restaurant in the Port Plaza parking lot each Saturday morning during the warmer months of the year.

Parade co-Chairperson Nicole Nadeau said this year’s parade should be the first time the event will be firing on all cylinders since COVID-19 after taking 2020 off and seeing a slow rebuild in 2021 and 2022.

“There’s been a big commitment from the Yankee Homecoming Committee to focus on some of the time-honored traditions that have made Yankee Homecoming so spectacular over the past 65 years and the parade is one of them,” she said.

The Yankee Homecoming Parade is also the longest-running fundraiser for The Jimmy Fund, according to Nadeau, who added that the classic collection will lead off the parade, along with fire apparatus from across the region, just as it has for over three decades.

Nadeau also promised roughly 15 musical acts will march down High Street on Sunday afternoon.

“In past years, we’ve had more of the traditional jazz and marching bands but this year we’re adding in a hip-hop band, an African drum band and a mariachi band,” she said. “Because we really want to celebrate the diversity around us.”

A cheerletics team, dance troops and cultural performers are also expected to liven up the parade.

“We’re really focused on having a wide variety (of attractions) this year,” Nadeau said.

Local auto enthusiast Bernie Casey, who founded Cars & Coffee in 2017, said Nadeau asked if some of his car owners would like to be a part of the Yankee Homecoming Parade this year and he told her he’d give it a shot.

Casey will be handing out flyers to his car owners on Saturday, letting them know they should get to the beginning of the parade route across from Famous Pizza at 2 Storey Ave. on Sunday at 11 a.m. to ride in the parade.

“You’re more than welcome to be a part of the parade,” he said. “All you need to do is show up across the street from Famous Pizza and get into it.”

Casey added that Cars & Coffee participants will not need to register for the parade and there will be no entrance fee.

Nadeau said she is open to hosting any type of unique vehicle.

“Whether it’s an antique car or a unique car, we’d love to have them all,” Nadeau said. “We want to be an attractive event for all the generations who want to watch the parade. So we have a lot of antique cars but also some really cool Corvettes and Thunderbirds and Porsches and more modern vehicles as well.”

Nadeau added the addition of antique and specialty cars shouldn’t make this year’s parade much longer to sit through.

“This is a return to the olden days but we’re still coming out of COVID and groups of people are struggling with staffing. So we don’t have quite as many floats as we have had in the past,” she said. “But we do feel like this year is a full-scale Yankee Homecoming Parade that will remind people what a fun, community event it is. Hopefully it will just keep growing from here every year.”

The parade is also still looking for volunteers on Sunday, according to Nadeau, who said interested participants can go to the parade tent in front of Famous Pizza between 9 and 10 a.m., to sign up.

Cars & Coffee will continue each Saturday from 7 a.m. to 9 a.m. until the weather gets cold.

“We usually go into October,” Casey said.

Staff writer Jim Sullivan covers Newburyport for The Daily News. He can be reached via email at [email protected] or by phone at 978-961-3145. Follow him on Twitter @ndnsully.

Staff writer Jim Sullivan covers Newburyport for The Daily News. He can be reached via email at [email protected] or by phone at 978-961-3145. Follow him on Twitter @ndnsully.

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