{"id":234922,"date":"2026-07-03T19:30:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T19:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/234922\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T19:30:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T19:30:07","slug":"philly-250th-parade-despite-heat-cancellation-tourists-flood-old-city","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/234922\/","title":{"rendered":"Philly 250th parade: Despite heat cancellation, tourists flood Old City"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>                    \u2018Really disappointed\u2019: Visitors travelled long distances for 250th parade<\/p>\n<p>DelBene said groups expected to march in the parade included people who\u2019d flown in from overseas and from all 50 U.S. states and U.S. territories. The groups included all 52 Miss America state and territory titleholders, military groups, the Korean American Association, Council of Indian Organizations, Chinese Benevolent Association, Tibetan Association, Filipino Association, high school marching bands from California, Alabama, Oklahoma and one band from Italy.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey fundraised, they\u2019ve sold chocolate bars and gone door-to-door and done car washes, and all of those amazing things that groups do to get here,\u201d he said. \u201cWe\u2019re just simply heartbroken that the culmination of that isn\u2019t going to be the parade that they hoped for.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Joe Seymour drove with his family up from Baltimore to march in the parade as part of a living history group portraying the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.243regiment.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">2nd Pennsylvania Regiment and 43rd Regiment of Foot<\/a>. He planned to wear a three-layered linen and wool uniform and cocked hat, which he described as \u201cnot as hot as it looks.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-large wp-image-746304\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/07-03-2026-k-paynter-250th-heat-bust-5-1024x683.jpg\" alt=\"Jaron and Lisa Theis appear alongside 3-year-old Henry, holding ice cream cones at Franklin Fountain in Old City, Philadelphia\" width=\"640\" height=\"427\"  \/>Locals Jaron and Lisa Theis brought Henry, 3, to the Franklin Fountain in Old City to keep cool during Independence Day celebrations in Philadelphia. (Kimberly Paynter\/WHYY)<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were ready to go, but you know kids these days,\u201d he joked. \u201cWeak and soft. We used to march uphill both ways in our parade.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re really disappointed,\u201d he added. \u201cBut we understand it was a safety call.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Despite the cancellation, Seymour said he was excited to be in Philadelphia for Independence Day.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s where it all happened,\u201d he said. \u201cSo many things that we take for granted today were fought over in the 18th century \u2026 these very basic freedoms that people had, the right to participate in government and to vote. We take it for granted these days, but it\u2019s so important to remember the values that were espoused in the Declaration of Independence.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u2018Really disappointed\u2019: Visitors travelled long distances for 250th parade DelBene said groups expected to march in the parade&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":234923,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[69,4001,71,70],"class_list":["post-234922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia","tag-philadelphia-250","tag-philadelphia-headlines","tag-philadelphia-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=234922"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/234922\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/234923"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=234922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=234922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=234922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}