The Lane Cotton Mill truck float “Queens of Cotton” in the Krewe of Crescent City’s second parade in 1947. The club was open to everyone, and riding groups were formed by fraternities, neighborhood clubs, businesses, families, and others. A yearly contest judges each truck on their theme, costumes, and decorations; winners get to lead the parade the following year.
The first official Mardi Gras truck parade was the Krewe of Elks Orleanians in 1935. For years prior, revelers would ride haphazardly around the city on trucks (and before that, carriages) on Mardi Gras day, keeping the celebrations going. Once organized, the trucks parade stuck to the specified St. Charles route, following Rex.
Eleven years later, in 1946, the Krewe of Crescent City debuted, founded by Russell Calongne and Mrs. George Rau. Their first parade of 38 decorated trucks and hundreds of masked riders down St. Charles Ave. was a great success.
While the Krewe of Crescent City mostly stuck to the Uptown route, they started their day at Canal St. and City Park Ave. to parade by hospitals and provide merriment to those who were unable to get to the Uptown route. They are believed to be the first parade krewe in New Orleans to do so. Their path passed by both Charity and Baptist hospitals as well as Hotel Dieu. After that, it would head to St. Charles Ave. and fall in behind the Krewe of Orleanians and follow them downtown.
In those early years, they were also the only entirely charitable club in the city. The krewe’s royalty was always children, either those in hospitals or orphanages (and later, the Chinchuba Institute for the Hearing Impaired). An Ash Wednesday party for the ward would be held yearly, with cakes and presents donated by local merchants. Their first king (in 1947) was eight-year-old Marcus Speed, Jr., who had just lost both feet beneath the wheels of a moving freight train on Christmas Eve.
The truck parades grew at a rapid rate. In 1971, the city passed an ordinance to limit the number of trucks per krewe; the Crescent City maximum is 75. Each year, the total number of trucks changes but generally is around 60-75, with a ridership of about 3000.
In 1978, they changed their name to the Crescent City Truck Parade and can still be found on St. Charles Ave., the last parade of Carnival, closing out the festivities in a shower of throws to large crowds.
