Students dressed up as characters from books like the Harry Potter series and "The Wizard of Oz" march up Duke Street on Friday afternoon. Tabitha Johnston

SHEPHERDSTOWN — On Friday afternoon, a beloved local tradition returned to Shepherdstown for the first time since the arrival of the COVID-19 Pandemic — the Shepherdstown Elementary School Storybook Parade.

Over 350 Shepherdstown Elementary School (SES) students and faculty members marched in the costumes of their favorite book characters, from their school building over to German Street and back again, with signs in hand and cheers floating in the breeze.

For SES speech pathologist Kayla Boggess, the hopeful result from this event, would be that it would encourage children to read more and decrease their screen time.

“Kids don’t read as much as they used to. I hope that they will be encouraged to read, by events like this,” Boggess, who was dressed as Wendy from “Peter Pan,” said. “Reading helps with speech development — with their vocabulary and language skills, as well as their overall development.”

According to SES Principal Scott Campbell, who was dressed as the title character of “The Cat in the Hat,” all but four students chose to participate in the event.

A pirate sails up Duke Street with the rest of Shepherdstown Elementary School's students and faculty members on Friday afternoon. Tabitha Johnston

“It was all voluntary. The kids could choose to do it, and just about every kids in the school chose to do so,” Campbell said. “A lot of them already knew their favorite characters from their favorite books. This gave them the opportunity to discuss their characters — they see someone dressed in a certain costume, and they start asking about them and learning about other books they might like to read.”

The parade, according to SES speech pathologist Sara Nell Di Lima, who was dressed as Dorothy from “The Wizard of Oz,” had possibly been going on for as long as 18 years.

“This has been a tradition at Shepherdstown Elementary for years, and now we’re back! We hadn’t done it since 2019, but we used to do it every other year,” said kindergarten teacher Michele Webb. “I think it does encourage kids to find new books to read and be reminded of books and characters that they’ve read about.”

Webb herself is one of several teachers who have encouraged the continuation of the Storybook Parade over the years, especially after seeing how the parade is cheered on by Shepherdstown residents and business owners. With the eventual relocation of SES outside of the Corporation of Shepherdstown, Webb noted that the future of the parade is uncertain.

“It’s nice that Shepherdstown is one of the few schools that can walk into their town and have participation from the town,” Webb said. “All along German Street, we had shop owners coming out to cheer us on for the parade. It was also a good way for parents to come out and be able to see us, in a way that they wouldn’t otherwise.

Smurfs, wizards and other book characters turn from Princess Street onto Duke Street, as they participate in the Shepherdstown Elementary School Book Parade on Friday. Tabitha Johnston

“We want to do the Storybook Parade as many times as we can, while we still can, because we can just walk out of the door into town right now. We wanted to bring the Storybook Parade back while we still could,” Webb said, noting that having to bus so many participants into town for the parade from the new school location might be unrealistic.

“There are four grade levels of students who have never gotten to do it before this year,” Webb said. “We were going to do it in the spring of 2020, and COVID forced it to be cancelled. But now all of the restrictions are gone and field trips are back, so this is just another Shepherdstown Elementary tradition we wanted to bring back, before we moved to a new building.”

Kanga and Eeyore, from the Winnie the Pooh book series, lead a pack of students up Duke Street, during the Shepherdstown Elementary School Book Parade on Friday afternoon. Tabitha Johnston

Shepherdstown Elementary School students and faculty members march up Duke Street and past the Shepherdstown post office on Friday afternoon. Tabitha Johnston