“But what is this parade for?” you might ask. Why Star Wars and what or who will it benefit?
Pug Crawl is a Portland tradition combining three ingredients prized by residents of the Pacific Northwest: microbrew beer, pugs, and helping shelter animals. This year’s attendance was estimated to be twice as high as last year’s Pug Crawl, a tribute to the popularity of pugs and the adoration they receive from their human companions.
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Undeterred by periods of “liquid sunshine” that punctuated the overcast afternoon, attendees applauded the full range of costumed characters brought to life by pugs: Princess Leia, Yoda, Ewoks, Obi Wan Kenobi, Darth Vader, Han Solo and more.
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Pug owners also showed their creativity by incorporating pugs into costumes that depicted the Death Star, Cloud City, TIE and X-Wing Fighters, BB8, the Millennium Falcon, an AT-AT, the Cantina and a Star Wars lunch box.
Organizers created a new category to honor the largest group of pugs to ever enter the contest as a single group. An interstellar group of pugs and people—including 28 pugs and 40 humans—paraded together as a marching band.
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Pacific Pug Rescue was awarded the first ever Group Grand Prize for their entry, which included Imperial Storm Troopers, Jedi Knights, the Millennium Falcon and more. A pair of horn players set the tone by playing the Star Wars theme as the group paraded down NW 31st Avenue.
This parade is especially poignant after the passing of our original Star War’s Princess Leia, Carrie Fisher. She adored dogs and even her own precious pup was at her bedside when she passed. She would have loved to know that Pug Crawl raised nearly twenty-eight thousand ($28,000) for shelter pets which is the highest amount in the history of the event!
For even more cute pics of pugs dressed in star wars costumes, go to => The Force Awakens – How Star Wars is Helping Pets for Adoption
All earnings go to the Oregon Humane Society. You can read more about this Pug Crawl at their website! The events' sponsors, as you can imagine, are over the moon! Or perhaps we should say… over the Death Star?
Featured Image via Oregon Humane Society
