SURGOINSVILLE — The 2024 Surgoinsville Christmas Parade, including Santa on a 1940s fire truck, made its way through downtown on a sunny Saturday morning.

Parade-goers heard the piercing sounds of a circus calliope as it rolled through downtown playing Christmas carols.

In the early 1940s, the William H. Block Company started sponsoring a downtown Christmas parade with the hope of enticing shoppers into the store. The first mention of such a parade in the ...