Announcing Waterbury’s NQID 2026 Parade theme: ‘American Time Machine’

March 25, 2026  |  By Dan McKibben

The Waterbury Rotary’s Not Quite Independence Day Committee is thrilled to partner with the Waterbury Town VT250 Committee to plan a grand celebration of the 250th anniversary of our nation’s founding – a once-in-a-generation milestone.

This year’s parade theme is patriotic, imaginative, and wide open for creative interpretation: American Time Machine.

We invite parade participants to take a journey through time – from the Revolutionary era to the roaring 1920s, the moon landing, Y2K, today’s innovations, and even visions of America’s future. Whether you’re channeling our founding ancestors, colonial inventors, jazz-age dreamers, civil rights heroes, 1960s music, or futuristic explorers – your entry can represent any era in our nation’s story.

Parade entries will be lined up in chronological order, creating a living timeline of American spirit, progress, and imagination. Costumes, floats, music, and storytelling are all encouraged – the more inventive, the better.

Let’s make this year’s NQID Parade a vibrant celebration of where we’ve been, who we are, and where we’re going.

NQID this year will be held on Saturday, June 27, with the parade starting at 4 p.m. The festivities will include the Green Mountain Mile footrace immediately ahead of the parade, food and games at Rusty Parker Memorial Park in downtown Waterbury, a concert with the Dave Keller Band after the parade, leading up to the fireworks display at dusk. 

More information, including how to register to be an entry in the parade, a vendor at the park, and a runner in the Green Mountain Mile, is online now on the Waterbury Rotary Club’s website under the NQID heading here.

Waterbury Rotarian Dan McKibben is a member of the NQID organizing committee.