Spectators flocked to North Broadway and Montrose Avenue to view the 52nd annual Chicago Pride Parade on Sunday.
To escape the heat, many people fanned themselves to stay cool while a marching band played music. A sudden downpour sent spectators scattering for cover shortly after the parade started. People shared umbrellas, while others entered a nearby restaurant.
Paraders were handing out pencils, rubber stress balls, cup holders, bags of candy, pride flags and beads. Others were seen singing, blowing kisses and high-fiving spectators.
Mayor Brandon Johnson and Gov. J.B. Pritzker were at the parade. Members of the Chicago Teachers Union rode on motor bikes, leading to a “teachers” chant from the crowd.
A woman wearing a black “free mom hugs” shirt gave hugs to onlookers who had their arms stretched out and smiling children sprayed water from a Nerf gun at spectators.
The crowd also sang Cascada’s “Everytime We Touch” in unison as it blared from one of the parade floats.
As paraders began walking through the closed off streets, one Chicago police officer was seen laughing with spectators. Some people were watching from apartment windows.
Lex Rybicki, 28, has been attending the parades on and off for 11 years. For her, the parade represents freedom.
“Even though we’re all strangers, it feels like one huge family coming together.”
Lex Rybicki ties a pride flag to her partner near the starting point of the 52nd annual Chicago Pride Parade in Uptown, Sunday, June 25, 2023.
Mohammad Samra / Chicago Sun-Times
Lalo Nuñez has attended the parade for nearly a decade. He says “his whole family is LGBTQ, and he is there for them.”
“I had a friend that passed away, and this is the first year that she’s not here, and she would want me to be here,” Nuñez said.
One woman has been attending parades since the early 1990s. The woman, only identified as Allie, said parades today “are a lot calmer than the ones she’d attend in Boystown where she lived.”
“It’s nice that today there are a lot more different types of people out there,” she said.
The parade, which runs through the Uptown, Northalsted and Lincoln Park communities, commemorates the 1969 Stonewall Riots, the protests in New York that were pivotal in the fight for LGBTQ+ rights in the United States.
The parade returned for a second straight year after cancellations due to the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 and 2021.
Interim Chicago Police Supt. Fred Waller outlined safety plans for the parade late last week, saying there will be additional officers and command posts.
More experienced officers will work after the parade and into Sunday night, and undercover officers will be in the crowds throughout the day, Waller said.
Officers’ days off were canceled to ensure the department has enough police to monitor the parade and other activities in the city, and the department’s counterterrorism unit has been monitoring for potential threats toward the parade or the LGBTQ+ community in general.
“We want to be accepted, we want to be welcomed, we want to be loved,” Rybicki said.