Krewe celebrates 25 years in Mardi Gras Fashion

The Krewe of Centaur turns 25 this year and presented King Larry Ryan and Queen Diane Aillet at the Grand Bal XXV on Jan. 16 at the Shreveport Convention Center. The Centaur parade, one of the largest parade in North Louisiana, rolls at 4:30 p.m. Jan. 30, beginning on Clyde Fant Parkway near Sci-Port: Louisiana’s Science Center and ending at Preston Street at Kings Highway.

Angela Costakis has been a member of Centaur for about 13 years. “This is the largest event in the Ark-La-Tex pulling in over half a million people for the Centaur parade on a weekend with good weather,” she said. “You get to tailgate, and it’s family friendly. It’s easy to park and easy to get here.”

Krewe of Centaur King 25 is Larry Ryan and even though it’s his first time as king, he’s been involved from the beginning. In fact, him and his late wife, Suzy, helped bring Mardi Gras to Natchitoches.

“Every year, the Centaur parade and crowds get bigger, he said. “We put about 400,000 people into that parade route. They come from Nebraska and Kansas and Missouri and Texas and Oklahoma. We wanted it to be really fun. We’ve had blue collars and white collars and commanders from Barksdale, and every one of them stood there with a hammer and paint with women bossing them around.”

•••• CENTAUR ROYALTY ••••

The Centaur membership as a whole elects the king and queen, while the dukes and duchesses volunteer and are selected by drawing.

“They are ceremonial,” Costakis said.

“They have no real governing power over the krewe, but they represent the krewe ceremoniously to the community and at other Mardi Gras events. The captain and the board of directors govern the Krewe of Centaur. Under them, you have a lieutenant guarding every float, and the riders report up to the lieutenants. The lieutenants elect a lieutenant coordinator who sits on the board and represents them on the board.”

The Krewe of Centaur has actually created its own royal lineage.

“If you serve as royalty, you carry that with you,” Costakis said. “You are still invited to royalty events even if you aren’t serving anymore. Once you serve as a king and queen, you are recognized at virtually every Centaur event. You will always be King 24 or Queen 14.”

There are many parties and gatherings hosted by various krewes and their royalty leading up to Twelfth Night, the official kick-off of the Mardi Gras season.

“Actually, you hear of the days of the British and the French court and the courtesans that are constantly visiting one another,” Costakis said. “We have 14 krewes in this area and a captain’s council that meets monthly. We have a lot of royal inter-krewe events during the months between coronations and the actual parades. It is based in tradition and history.”

•••• ART IN THE BEGINNING ••••

Harvey Dillahunty is a founding member of Centaur, serving as King No. 9 in 2000, and he remembers the very first meeting back in 1991, at a popular bar and hangout called Cowboys. “My sister Linda told me they were having a meeting at Cowboys to talk about the Krewe of Centaur and when we got there, there were 200 people. I hardly knew anybody in that room.”

Dillahunty said he quickly got to know more people in the krewe. “Just by working on the floats, we met 40 or 50 people that year. That’s what it’s all about. It’s a wonderful social organization, and it’s all about fun,” Dillahunty said.

Surprisingly, there hasn’t been a whole lot of change in Centaur except for the tremendous growth of the organization and the parade it presents to North Louisiana. That growth means more people and more parties, but the bar for creativity was set pretty high very early on.

“Some of the people who helped organize Centaur were artists, and it was an off year for Christmas in the Sky,” Dillahunty said. “They kind of set our creativity level, and it just keeps getting better.”

Dillahunty said the Mardi Gras season for this year is shorter since it falls on Feb. 9. “When I was king, I got to enjoy my reign for two months. The ball is real exciting. It’s very formal and personalities change when you put on a mask,” he said.

•••• FLOATING ON ••••

Technology has brought change to the floatmaking process, which Dillahunty said just keeps getting better.

“Our floats can now hold 40 people. LED lighting, and better wiring and generators make it easier, but the basic float is on a trailer.”

That was not always the case. Capt. Randy James, who leads Centaur’s board of directors, remembers the acquisition of two school buses from the Caddo Parish School Board auction well.

“We took them to Pipes, and they took each one down to a hood, the fender the steering wheels. They also left the seats and the two doors. I had to drive it down [Interstate 20] one time, with a friend following me. When we got to a red light there were three ladies standing on the bus stop. I pulled up next to them and asked, ‘You girls going uptown or downtown?’ I took off without a word and when I turned around to look at them they were still standing there shocked. My favorite float ever was that same float when we turned it into a long guitar and riders dressed up as their favorite musicians.”

Costakis pointed out the school bus floats are the only ones with real drivers. “The driver actually sits down. All the rest of the floats are towed by trucks.”

Dillahunty had his own experiences to share about the bus floats. “One year, we had just started the parade and got to Shreve City and when we stopped, the float died in the middle of Shreveport Barksdale Highway. We all got out and pushed and got the driver to pop the clutch, and it cranked right up.”

Another year, the parade had just begun pulling out of the Pierre Bossier Mall into the parade route when a tire went flat. “We didn’t have a spare,” Dillahunty said. “They pushed our float over to the side at I-20. Brock’s in West Shreveport got a spare tire and put it on our float and got it going again, but the police chief said it was too late. But Mike Middleton just happened to be riding the float with us, and he was a Caddo Parish Deputy. He pulled the police officers to the side and said, ‘Please don’t do this to them. They’ve worked all year long on this.’ He talked them into letting us go, but the parade was almost to the Shreveport Barksdale Bridge. They gave us a police escort and I felt like I was in the movie ‘Animal House’ with the float is racing down the street.”

The captain and the entire krewe were holding the parade on the bridge to let the tardy float, catch up when, to make matters worse, a car ran right into the side of the float.

“It didn’t cripple the float,” Dillahunty said. “The officers just said, ‘Y’all keep going.’ We were the last float, and we still had all of our throws we hadn’t thrown in Bossier, so we had a ton of throws for the crowd. Now all Centaur floats carry a spare tire.”

“When you’re in a krewe, you’re assigned to a float, and you spend a lot of time with your float family,” Costakis said. “Every float has its own little stall, and the float people, the riders, typically have refrigerators, grills and tailgating set ups.”

•••• CELEBRATING CENTAUR ••••

There have been many milestone celebrations for Centaur, with celebrities such as Bill Paxton and local Bill Joyce serving as grand marshal, but Mardi Gras 2012, shortly after the 9/11 attacks, was particularly memorable.

“After 9/11, we actually brought firefighters and police officers from New York to participate,” Dillahunty said. “We made them grand marshals.”

Mardi Gras is all about the crazy, however. “We’ve seen fathers put kids on their shoulders and walk right up to the first level and the kids will just put their arms around a throw container and just start scooping and dumping throws down to all the people,” Costakis said. “That is the equivalent of walking into a jewelry store and stealing everything you can. Not to mention the safety. We’ve also had people in the crowd throw whole cans or bottles of beers at riders. We don’t love that.”

James said the krewe stresses the importance of being family oriented.

“We stressed that we were going to be the fun group, the family crew,” James said. “We really think we are making this community better. It’s a free parade for the entire community, and it just makes people happy.”

“I have ridden in New Orleans Mardi Gras and I have friends there,” added Dillahunty. “But whenever you ride in your home town, it’s just so much more fulfilling. Upstate, as I call it. You see all these people you know when you’re throwing. It’s really special. There is less pain, such as the wildness of the French Quarter, but the pomp and circumstance of it all is definitely similar. It’s a wonderful time.”

Learn more:

For more information about the Krewe of Centaur, go to kreweofcentaur.org.

For a complete listing of Mardi Gras parade times and street closure information, go to www.shreveportla.gov/index.aspx?NID=407.

Mardi Gras Calendar

Jan. 23 • Line up at 3 p.m., start at 4:30 p.m. Minden Fasching Parade. • 1 p.m. Springhill Parade Info: 539-5681.

Jan. 29 • 5:30 to 9 p.m., Krewe of Centaur Float Loading Party

Jan. 30 • 4:30 p.m., Krewe of Centaur Parade, Clyde Fant, Shreveport- Barksdale, Kings Highway (ends at Preston)

Jan. 31 • noon, Barkus & Meoux Pet Parade, Bossier City (former location of Reeves Marine, Bossier Parkway)

Feb. 5 • 5 p.m., Krewe of Gemini Float Loading. Open to the Public. Located at Gemini Den 2101 East Texas St. Bossier City

Feb. 6 • 4:30 p.m., Krewe of Gemini Parade,Clyde Fant, Shreveport- Barksdale, Kings Highway (ends at Preston)

Feb. 7 • 1 p.m., Krewe of Highland Parade, Highland Neighborhood. For more information, email kreweofhighlandparade@gmail. com or follow their Facebook page.