Wednesday, November 23, 2011

MACY'S THANKSGIVINGDAY PARADE

Many thanks to Mike Fontanelli for the tres cool pictures of past Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parades. Wow! How beautiful these balloons are! No wonder the parade attracted such big crowds. The gradual reveal of things like Pinocchio's enormous nose could only be appreciated by people who saw it in person. TV wouldn't have done it justice!


A magnificent crow (above), but who are the people who are carrying it? I like to think they're members of a secret society who just couldn't resist showing off their club's symbol.


Half the fun of any parade is watching people (above) in the crowd. I notice the kids in this picture are wearing the kind of clothes worn by the kids in the "Christmas Story" movie. My parents used to dress me like that. Only the cheeks were unprotected, and they froze like crazy!


Here's (above) Uncle Sam protecting everybody.


Unbelievable! Look at that crowd (above)! What if someone in there had to pee? How would he have done it?


A wild turkey takes flight (above). Look at those crazed eyes!


This (above) is indisputably the best Superman balloon ever to grace the parade!


People in those days (above) certainly had a taste for cartoon weirdness! Balloons today are too perfect, too middle of the road, too on-model.


I like how every parade ended with Santa, who was surrounded by dozens of beautiful women. Boy, Santa was the Hugh Hefner of his day!


When I was a kid nobody did any Christmas shopping til after Thanksgiving. Nobody tried to beat the crowds by shopping early, they just waited til the last minute then everybody shopped at the same time, shoulder to shoulder...what an ordeal!

Christmas shopping for us kids was easy. Mothers got quart bottles of cheap perfume or fuzzy slippers. Dads got ties. We kids really believed that they treasured those presents, and we devoted a lot of time to making sure that they used them.

My favorite thing to do was to visit the toy departments (above) in the big department stores. Sometimes they'd devote half of a whole floor to toys, and they were the kind of toys you couldn't get in your local neighborhood shops: chemistry sets, air rifles, Erector Sets, marionettes, space ships and space helmets, toy soldiers...what a feast! There was always a giant diorama showing all the top of the line toy trains weaving in and out of mountain tunnels and trestles. It was heaven for kids but hell for adults, who had to pry their crying kids unwilling fingers from toy shelves when it was time to go home.

Oh, well...enough nostalgia! Happy Thanksgiving everybody!!!!!!

12 comments:

Joshua Marchant (Scrawnycartoons) said...

I found these photos of some Macy's parade balloons http://bit.ly/t68Knf
The Mighty mouse and Popeye are my favorites

We have a similar parade here in New Zealand. It actually takes place on the same street my animation school is on. There's a giant Santa statue sitting outside my class window right now!

Mattieshoe said...

IS seems like "sophistications" in design have taken away what used to be fun and funny about parade balloons. Instead of trying to hide the fact that they're balloons, they use it to their advantage to look unique and specific.

Tim Burton is supposed to have a float in today's Macy's parade, Judging by the beautiful, cartoony floats be designed for the Joker parade in Batman We should be in for something special

http://mimg.ugo.com/201104/9/5/3/184359/cuts/batman-21_786_poster.jpg

Mattieshoe said...

I mean Balloons, or course. <.<

Anonymous said...

http://www.avclub.com/articles/look-kids-its-eddie-cantor-12-obscure-macys-thanks,47967/

Mark Kausler said...

These early Macy's balloons are mainly the creations of Tony Sarg, master puppeteer and early animator of cut-out films. Bil Baird was his apprentice in the 1930s.

Anonymous said...

http://imgur.com/BHYIA A somewhat less heroic Superman balloon. John K would like this one I think.

Eddie Fitzgerald said...

Joshua: Thanks for the Macy's link, and...Do they really do stuff like that in New Zealand!? That's great! Try to convince someone to do a giant Stimpy or George Liquor.

Anon: Eddie Cantor looks great there! I wonder if there were any other caricature balloons.

Mark: Tony Sarg? Didn't he do the famous Times Square "smoke rings" billboard?

Eddie Fitzgerald said...

Mattieshoe: Thanks for the link! Tim Burton's balloon was right in line with the weirdness that rampant in the pre-WW2 graphic arts.

Eddie Fitzgerald said...

Mattieshoe: Thanks for the link! Tim Burton's balloon was right in line with the weirdness that rampant in the pre-WW2 graphic arts.

Anon: Haw!

Anonymous said...

Is Tim Burtons work in line with pre ww2 stuff because of the German impressionist influence?

What are your thoughts on Tim Burton? I'm squarely in the "mixed" camp but I'd be interested to hear your take on him.

CartoonSteve said...

Nice post! Those balloons remind me of Tex Avery's "King Size Canary". Remember all the great elaborate robotic window displays back then? Even my small town had them.

Eddie Fitzgerald said...

Anon: I like Tim Burton. He doesn't always succeed, but when he does it's always a lot of fun!

Cartoon Steve: Yeah, why don't stores do that anymore?