By Dianne Anderson

Upbeat live music, good tasty eats, and the dignitaries will shine.

Another star studded lineup of entertainment, steppers, and drummers will soon hit the streets for this year’s OC Black History Parade & Unity Festival celebration of culture, community, free prizes, especially what always brings out thousands from far and wide.

The real stuff can be found deep within.

Dwayne Shipp said their Unity Festival normally begins with entertainment and musical bands, but this year the drum line competition starts the festival.

“At the end of the parade, the bands will march down the main street to the festival and meet in the middle for the drum battle. When you look at the Rose Parade, you look at the marching band and floats,” said Shipp, president of the Orange County Heritage Council.

Their parade may not be as big as the Rose Parade yet, but his personal goal is to get there by the time the parade turns 50.

“Our goal as a unit is to rebrand it as the California Black History Parade. When you come to California, you think of three parades. The Rose Parade, the Kingdom Day Parade, and the California Black History Parade,” he said.

On Saturday, February 7, the “Unity in Purpose” 46th Annual OC Black History Parade & Unity Festival is held from 9:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m., located at 205 Center St. Promenade in Anaheim. There, over 15 marching bands are bussed in with the help of JFK Transportation from as far as Dorsey, Crenshaw, Long Beach Poly, Fremont, Lakewood, and Banning, plus the Fernando Pulluman Center.

Leading the way will be this year’s Division Marshals Tammy Tumbling, Deborah Wondercheck, Gregory Scott, and Ronald S. Rochon. Hosted by Eric J. Chambers and Destiny Marie, the festival grounds will be packing over 150 vendors, 30 food stalls, along with a Youth Village including sports activities, inflatables, and a college fair.

For high-energy entertainment, the event features the Slapbak Band, music producer and songwriter originally from Compton Cory “Knotch” Marks, and singer, songwriter, and pianist Don Sleven. Festivities also feature two performance stages, the Freedom Stage and Unity Stage, with live music, comedy, giveaways, and prize winnings.

Shipp, also president of the Orange County Heritage Council, said this year their “post and win” lets participants take a picture next to African American great historic influencer posters that stand 8-foot-tall and 10-foot-wide, such as President Obama.

Someone will monitor the social media competition for trending hashtag posts for the parade, and winners take home prizes like tickets to Disneyland, sweaters, merchandise, along with a lot more giveaways, he said.

What’s new this year is the street banners, like typical hometown unsung hero banners, will hang from the city poles that line Anaheim Blvd in the vicinity of the parade and displayed the whole month long.

“Along the parade route, Black images, people like my mother, Tammy Tumbling Division Marshal, people driving down the street can see the images,” he said. “It’s going to run the entire month of February honoring Black people because Black History is American history.”

He is always amazed by the great deal of support that has poured in from so many places to help make the event a success, but he knows where it comes from.

“It costs, but it didn’t cost what it normally would cost, but you look at the value over the cost,” he said. “When you have favor of the Most High God and hearts of the people, it’s always the right time to do the right thing.”

If his mom, Helen Shipp, who started the parade in 1968, were alive, she would be in her late 90s. Looking at the intensity of the political and social situation today, he believes that she would simply say just keep waking up, because everything has a season.

The parade has grown strong, just as she learned early on at 16 years old, watching her mother for months who was terminally ill, who was preparing and teaching her to survive the world ahead.

These days are rough, but he said his mom faced worse times. In her day, lynchings and killings were the norm, but he said she inspired him to keep the parade and community outreach going, and he hopes to inspire the next person to do the same.

“Because the work never stops, and the work done 50 years ago is going to be needed 50 years from now,” he said.

Through the event, he said they don’t support any “low vibrations, nothing that is going to tear any family apart,” because love is the only thing that conquers hate. Behind this year’s theme of “Unity in Purpose,” he sees people working together, everyone sharing a common plan to help one another stay focused on what they want to achieve.

“At the end of the day we all need one another,” he said. “We all have to keep waking up every day and working together. That’s how we’re going to build a better world, not a country, not a state, a better world and unity.”

For more information, see https://www.oc-hc.org/