GLOCESTER – On Saturday, under a dark sky in 30 degree weather, about a hundred people were mulling around Main Street at 6 p.m., shopping, sipping hot beverages, or just waiting for Santa Claus, while hundreds more throughout town were partying by firelight, waiting outside their homes for the Glocester Police & Fire Departments’ annual Christmas parade.
That’s according to Santa Clause – rumored in town by various grinches to sometimes be Lt. Jeffrey Jenison of the Glocester Police Department – who saw the parade from his unique perspective riding atop a decorated firetruck, then riding in a horses-drawn sleigh.
The man from the North Pole explained the first Christmas parade was during the Covid days of “six feet apart” and masked faces. Today, the parade has transformed into a bigger than ever festive favorite, explained Claus.
“I love doing it, seeing smiling faces of kids screaming ‘Santa!” he said.
Seeing shoppers on Main Street also pleases him. The parade originated from the pandemic days, “and we make it bigger and better every year,” he said.
Those days might have seemed like ancient history as people along the parade route shouted “Merry Christmas!” as Santa Claus passed by, along with about a dozen brightly decorated police vehicles, rescue vehicles, firetrucks, and the Glocester Command Center vehicle.
Glocester town spirit and the holiday spirit were both evident as Deidra Nicholas and two fellow members of the Ponaganset High School baseball booster club, Anastasia Wachter and Trish St. Onge, served up hot chocolate and doughboys outside St. Onge’s “Trish Hampton Pet Boutique,” where are found hand-made designer dog collars, harnesses, leashes, bow ties, bandanas, as well as gear for pet owners, including doggy Christmas tree ornaments.
A visitor stopped at the outdoor table of steaming chocolate and freshly-off-the-griddle dough boys. Funds raised were toward the teen baseball team’s forthcoming visit to The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, N.Y. in April, explained Nicholas. Assisting crossing pedestrians at the busy crosswalk were some members of the Ponaganset baseball team, and they were holding red flags.
Even before the parade began that night, shops took part by staying open past regular hours for last-minute gift-buyers and others, including their frequent shoppers, searching for some special thing.
Karen Garnett of The Vintage Connection was open for business.
“We have a lot of people who come back,” she said of her clothing and collectibles business of two years in Chepachet. Garnett’s storefront area, decorated with a Christmas tree, was particularly festive-looking. The shop-owner said she “loves meeting people and carrying on conversations. People are so interesting.”
“I love shopping in Chepachet year round,” explained Garnett’s customer, Susan Paloma of North Scituate. Paloma was unaware that the parade of police and fire and other vehicles would soon roll down the street and was considering staying for it as a person who “loves the vintage shops and supporting small business.”
The freezing and colder marks on outdoor thermometers during the last couple of Candlelight Shopping Thursdays, of which this past Saturday was an extension, did not deter shoppers.
“Customers don’t care. They will come,” explained Kim Loxley Bellavoine, owner of the nearby group shop The Hen House, which sells goods produced by dozens of artisans. Often the shop, brimming with festive decorations, is frequented by the same people, week after week, and during the Christmas shopping season, “the check out line winds out the door,” she said.
“I love working here, my home away from home,” said Abby Froment, who was working at the counter as customers kept coming in.
“Chepachet has the quintessential small town feel,” said Village Trading Cards store owner Lily Martin.
That’s especially true when “folks are walking up and down for candlelight shopping” and awaiting the parade. Chepachet, Martin said, “feels homey.”
“I open the door and hear karaoke,” playing somewhere down the street, said Martin.
The Village Art Cooperative, in the historic Job Armstrong building, headquarters of the Glocester Heritage Society, started during COVID by the owner of The Hen House “to get people shopping,” said Karen Falvet of Karen Adria Crochet. The group shop hosts 18 local artists from within a 50 mile radius, with most local to the area. Saturday was the shop’s last night in business for the season; they will reopen for Labor Day in 2026.
Meanwhile, one of the artists, Sew Hoppy’s Lauren Hopkins, awaited the parade. She’s in her first year with the co-op and crafts purses, quilts, and does embroidery.
“It’s a wonderful community,” she said of Glocester. “They really try to get people together. It’s a very tight knit community.”
Santa Claus, after the parade, gave a “shout out to the Liberty Farm for supplying the carriage horses—that aspect of the parade is fantastic.”
He said he was particularly grateful to Chip Tucker at the farm and that he appreciates the sleigh used for Santa’s ride.
The ride began on a firetruck at West Glocester Fire Station, then the parade of vehicles traveled to the Senior Center where Santa switched to a sleigh, and then, once through the Chepachet Village, he moved back to the firetruck to into Harmony’s Saw Mill Road, then on to Ponaganset High School.
Santa rode on the sleigh only a short way for expediency, “otherwise the parade would take much longer” to snake around town, he explained. The Jolly Old Elf credited Trish Hampton and the GBA as well as the Harmony, Chepachet, and West Glocester Fire Departments, and Mrs. Claus – rumored to sometimes be Amy Waterman of the Harmony Fire Department.
