Toms River Halloween Parade 2026: Downtown's 87th Parade Goes Red, White and Boo for America's 250th
Toms River's 87th Halloween Parade steps off downtown at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 31. It's billed as the second-largest in the country, and this year, per TomsRiver.org, it gets a patriotic twist for America's 250th.
Toms River's Halloween Parade steps off downtown at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 31, and it's the 87th parade. It's billed as the country's second-largest Halloween parade, trailing only the giant one in Greenwich Village. Second. To New York City.
Hold on. Who decided that? Who stood up in a firehouse and said, "We're a town in Ocean County, so obviously we're coming for Manhattan"? Where I'm from, a town that isn't New York City would be happy with a nice Halloween and a bake sale. Toms River looked at New York City and said, "Move over."
Here's what I'm learning about Jersey. Nobody here cares that you're not the biggest. They care whether you act like it. And Toms River acts like it's been the biggest the whole time.
So the way I see it, this parade is the best minor-league team in America, playing one stadium over from the Yankees and refusing to admit it's the farm team.
It has the career numbers, for one. Eighty-seven seasons. Toms River Volunteer Fire Co. No. 1 runs the show, and it's free to watch. The route runs through downtown, along Main Street and Washington Street. I picture families where the grandparents marched, the parents marched and the kids are marching now, in costumes built in the same garage. At this point the parade has been around so long that the streets probably know the route better than the drivers. Give it a few more decades and the floats will turn onto Washington Street on their own, like a dog who knows the way home.
This season, the team is wearing throwback uniforms. According to TomsRiver.org, the 2026 parade has a patriotic theme for America's 250th anniversary. So Halloween is suiting up in red, white and blue. I keep trying to picture it and my brain buffers. Skeletons in tricorn hats. Ghosts in powdered wigs. A jack-o'-lantern holding a tiny flag like it just got drafted. It's going to look like the Fourth of July and Halloween swapped closets in the dark and walked out anyway. TomsRiver.org also says the grand marshal is an ex-chief, honored for more than 50 years of volunteer service to the Toms River community. Fifty years. Somebody should retire his jersey number tonight.
And this year it's a night game with no curfew. Halloween lands on a Saturday. Nobody has school in the morning. Nobody has work. The classic grown-up exit line, "I've got an early day tomorrow," is benched for the season. TomsRiver.org says to expect big crowds and traffic restrictions, and to get there early with a chair or a blanket. How early? Early enough to watch the jack-o'-lanterns get carved. Early enough to catch batting practice. Early enough that the fire trucks start giving you a little nod, like you're on the roster.
Then there are tryouts. Registration runs Tuesday nights in October at the Robbins Street firehouse, 6 to 8 p.m., and the last one is Tuesday, Oct. 27. Miss it and TomsRiver.org says there's parade-day registration on Oct. 31, from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. The fire company's parade page has the details.
So here's the scouting report. Eighty-seven seasons. Throwback uniforms for the 250th. A grand marshal with half a century of service. A Saturday night game with no curfew, and a town that calls itself number two in America without blinking.
And me? I showed up asking how a town that isn't Manhattan gets the nerve to line up behind Manhattan. Now I'm pricing tricorn hats and practicing a parade wave in the mirror. If I go to tryouts on the 27th, I'm not making the team as a float. I'm making it as the guy who carries everybody's folding chairs.
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