The World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day Parade In Enterprise, Alabama

When planning the first year of our 5 year, 50 state road trip, we knew we had to be in Enterprise, Alabama on March 17.

That’s because Enterprise is home to the World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day parade and even holds the Guinness World Record for the achievement.

Why’s it the World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day Parade? Because it consists of just one person who walks the block from the courthouse up to the city’s Boll Weevil Monument and then back again.

Shae and I hadn’t realized when we first planned our trip there, but 2018 turned out to be the 25th annual World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day Parade. The parade was due to start at 12pm, so we arrived in downtown Enterprise at 11:30am to make sure we’d be on time.

We parked a couple of blocks away from the Boll Weevil monument and started walking in that direction. As we passed by a clothing store, we saw a sign that summed up how Truffles lives her life (well, how we make Truffles live her life.)

Yep, she’s wearing a leprechaun outfit that we bought during our trip to Ireland last year.

We arrived at the Boll Weevil monument a couple of minutes later and turned left down College St. There was already a pretty good crowd lining the street, ready for the special occasion.

Due to it being the 25th time the event was being held, commemorative T-shirts had been made featuring the cutest boll weevil you’ll ever see.

History Of Enterprise’s Parade

Back in the 90s, Kathleen Sauer and Lucy Klein hit on the idea of starting a St Patrick’s Day parade in Enterprise. Both were transplants from other cities that had parades, but this Alabamian city of ~25,000 people had no such celebration.

So in 1998, they started a new tradition. Rather than having a full parade through the streets, they’d have one that consisted of just one person. It wouldn’t be a long distance either – it’d start at the Coffee County Courthouse, go up to the Boll Weevil Monument a block away and then come back.

Kathleen Sauer was the first Grand Marshal of the parade in 1998, with many different Grand Marshals taking over in subsequent years.

The Grand Marshals

All the past Grand Marshals were gathered at this year’s parade to celebrate its 25th anniversary. To be eligible to perform as the Grand Marshal, you must be able to fulfill three criteria:

1. Must be of Irish descent in some way
2. Have to be able to walk / march / dance the parade route, and
3. Have to be a resident of Enterprise

Although that meant we weren’t eligible to be Grand Marshals, we still got to have our photo taken with them. Standing at the back to the right of Shae was this year’s Grand Marshal – Maggie Haas.

The parade was due to begin a few minutes later, so we made our way to the side of the road to be part of the event we’d especially come to Enterprise to experience.

The 25th Annual World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day Parade

The parade started promptly at 12pm. Maggie made her way from the Courthouse, skipping, dancing and waving her way up College St.

Even Truffles was excited about what was going on.

Grand Marshal Maggie was soon halfway along the parade route where we were standing.

She was soon past us and on her way up to the Boll Weevil Monument.

While we waited for her to go round the monument and come back down the road, Truffles articulated her thoughts about the event for the local news channel.

Soon enough, Maggie was on her way back down the road.

Before we knew it, she’d passed us and was on the home stretch back to the Courthouse.

That wasn’t the last we’d see of her though, as we got to have our photo taken with the 2018 Grand Marshal of the World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day Parade afterwards.

Seeing as Truffles was dressed as a leprechaun, she had her photo taken with a real-life leprechaun. I think she thought her outfit enabled her to fly though…

The After Party

Before the parade began, Shae and I chatted to some of the locals and told them Enterprise’s St Patrick’s Day parade was the specific reason we’d decided to visit Alabama during March this year. That inevitably led to us sharing about our 5 year, 50 state road trip; our story intrigued quite a few of them and we were invited to the parade’s after party at Boll Weevil Brewing Supply so they could find out more.

We had a choice of a couple of drinks when we arrived – Irish stout or a green cream ale – with both Shae and I going for the green cream ale. Even though she doesn’t enjoy beer, she actually, sort of, almost, just about, liked this one – high praise indeed for a homebrewed beer by the owners of Boll Weevil Brewing Supply.

Truffles on the other hand wasn’t so sure. The only green things she’ll stick in her mouth are teenie Greenies.

Not only was there free beer, but there were also free snacks.

We had a great time at the after party chatting to some of Enterprise’s residents. One of them – Guillain – contacted a journalist for the local paper and told him what we were up to. A couple of days later, he interviewed us and published a story in the Enterprise Ledger about our adventures.

We also chatted to Rob who offered us a couple of tickets to that evening’s homebrew competition. Our original plan had been to visit Dothan as Folklore Brewery had all kinds of St Patrick’s Day festivities planned. This homebrew competition sounded even more fun though, plus we’d get to spend more time getting to know the people we’d been chatting to. The homebrew competition was awesome with a grapefruit IPA, cherry mead, Lucky Charms Irish Red and lots more – read more about it here.

Final Thoughts

The 25th annual World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day parade was incredibly fun. It’s a fun and quirky event which is enhanced by Enterprise’s friendly and welcoming residents.

The parade was the start of such a good time in Enterprise, Shae and I are already making plans to return to the city in the future.

If you want to celebrate St Patrick’s Day in a completely unique way, you should definitely make your way to Enterprise on March 17.