In New York, most folks treat Thanksgiving as a chance to celebrate, gather with family, and importantly, take a well‑deserved break from work.
For some, though, it’s the wildest day of the year, with no pause for rest in sight.
As you dig into your yearly turkey, pause to honor three unsung Big Apple saviors who glide through different corners of the city. They sprint into action— keeping the streets warm, the tables fed, and the holiday spirit alive.
Yes to the dress
Kimberly Montgomery is pictured with some of the 4,000 parade costumes at the Macy’s Studio last week. LP Media
As the costume director for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, Kimberly Montgomery’s fourth Thursday’s sunrise comes a full day before most of the city wakes.
She rises at 2:30 a.m., buzzing with adrenaline and ready to manage the outfitting of 4,000 participants.
“We have 2,000 balloon handlers, 750 clowns, about 300 float escorts, about 100 costumed characters, 300 children, 500 people in officials’ jackets, and the dance teams,” Montgomery told The Post in advance of the 2025 edition.
Montgomery, 64, has been a seasoned pro since 2000, and she looks back on the moment she stepped into the role with sheer enthusiasm.
“From the minute I stepped into that job I felt like I was in the right place. I just thought, ‘My God, this is so cool, and I’m absolutely loving this.’”
Her Broadway roots and a chance meeting with parade creative director Bill Schermerhorn set the stage.
She recalls asking him for a runner position in 2000, landing a data‑entry gig, and then learning the parade from the ground up.
“I asked him, ‘Hey, do you ever need a runner or somebody who can come in for a week?’ I got hired to be the data entry person, and I literally learned the parade from the bottom up.”
In 2003 she graduated to costume director, a position she’s kept since.
A tight routine marks her Thanksgiving morning: after the early alarm, she meets a crew of ten at the Tick Tock Diner on 8th Ave. and W. 34th St. for breakfast, readying themselves for the frantic pace ahead.
“At 4:15 a.m., we meet about 200 of our parade day dressers and makeup artists, and we get the walkie‑talkies going and turn the lights on in the dressing venues. At 5 a.m., we open the doors.”
What follows is a steady stream of parade entrants arriving for their suits. While the role demands precision and organization, adaptability is equally vital.
“I am actually the queen of plan B,” she quipped. “I’ve always got in my head ‘What could plan B be if plan A doesn’t work out? I’ve already got those things in my head for just about everything in the parade.”
Unlike many large events, Macy’s skips pre‑parade fittings, leaving a bit of roulette to the morning’s rush.
She relies on recorded measurements, but admits surprise can still happen.
“It’s a little bit of roulette on the Thursday morning in some situations. But we have looked at heights, weights, inseams and all those things. Sometimes people lie a little bit, so we do have a surprise or two on occasion, but we try to prepare for plan B.”
From 5 a.m. until the close of business at 2:30 p.m., her crew navigates the wave of energy, folding it back into order with meticulous planning.
“Last year, everything was soaked to the socks,” Montgomery recalled, comparing last season’s rainy chaos.
Once the parade wraps, the undoing is as swift as the dressing: garments are packed back into racks, then slid by truck to a New Jersey storage site.
She emphasizes ensuring the venue is spotless before Santa’s arrival, noting that the costumes are often reused, sometimes on a multi‑year contract.
“We do that with every float in between Turkey and Santa [the last float]. So by the time Santa comes back, that’s the only rack sitting in all these venues… Literally everything else has been cleaned up.”
Rain’s potential threat is a major concern; costume companies can lose millions if fabrics mildew.
“Last year, everything was soaked to the socks. We had to get those dry within like 72 hours before they mildewed, otherwise you lose millions and millions of dollars worth of costumes.”
Mid‑afternoon sees her duties wind down, and she looks forward to enjoying Thanksgiving with her husband and two grown‑up sons— one of whom is part of this season’s parade.
The family usually heads to a city hotel for the meal, and Montgomery admits she’s far from up for cooking that day.
“I try to avoid cooking at all costs, whether it’s Thanksgiving or any day of the week,” she laughed. “I’m not the best at that.”
Despite being closer to retirement, she will return next year for the centennial parade, proud to help craft memories for the crowds watching live and those tuning in at home.
“I grew up in Missouri, where I watched the parade on television— decades before I even imagined taking such a prominent role in the event.”
“Remember watching the parade with my dad on television in St. Louis,” she reflected. “When I moved to New York City in 1988, I made it a point to stand on the street with my shoes in the cold and watch Macy’s parade go by, which I did.”
“It really does kick off the holiday season. Macy’s has been doing this for 99 years— that’s pretty phenomenal.”
The host with the most
Marty Rogers, 70, organizes a sit‑down meal for hundreds in his neighborhood, the Melrose section of The Bronx. Stefano Giovannini for Ny Post
At 70, retiree Marty Rogers knows little about sitting back on Thanksgiving.
For 47 years, he’s been the backbone of the parish’s annual dinner for neighbors in need— an event he began organizing as a youth and now leads.
The free feast started as a solution for elders in the church with no family nearby; the Immaculate Conception youth group pitched in to provide a modest meal.
Rogers chuckles recalling their early efforts:
“We had three turkeys, which we conned our parents into making. Because we were high school and college folks, we weren’t exactly doing much in terms of the kitchen. But the need was there.”
Today, the event has grown into a church‑basement spectacle that serves 40 turkeys to 150 volunteers, with multiple courses and, more recently, local Mexican dance performances.
Rogers jokes:
“We’re like Radio City Music Hall, except we feed you.”
The church prepares staples like mashed potatoes, stuffing, and cranberry sauce to fill about 500 hungry mouths; roughly 200 sit in the hall, while the rest receive meals to take home.
The effort is heavily powered by youth volunteers, spanning elementary to high school, and Rogers proudly highlights that his wife, three adult children, and grandchildren have all helped over the years.
“The church doesn’t promote the dinner online," he says. "We rely on word‑of‑mouth and flyers during my regular Hope Walks on E. 149th St., where I hand out sandwiches and encouragement throughout the year."
Total expenses run near $3,000— but if the church had to purchase the turkeys, costs would jump to over $7,000, thanks to a partnered turkey drive run by the Sisters of the Christian Charity.
Volunteers spruce up the hall the Monday before Thanksgiving with streamers and festive décor— making the space welcoming and bright.
Some volunteers bring their own turkeys home, seasoned with everything from garlic to jerk spice, creating a medley of aromas.
During the service itself, Rogers insists on a “five‑star restaurant” atmosphere.
“When the guests come in, they’re greeted, they get a name tag. Everyone calls each other by their name. Then they go to the maître d’, who wears a bow tie and seats people… We take care of them; that’s our motto. We don’t want them to get up.”
Many volunteers are bilingual, enabling them to serve the large Spanish‑speaking patronage and pass plates efficiently.
Rogers encourages younger aides to talk with guests rather than stare at their phones; he’s seen many engage willingly.
Mary Anne Christopher, a fellow parishioner, echoes his sentiment.
“He asks, and we answer. He’s pretty much like, ‘No pressure, do what you can,’ but people figure it out because they want to help.”
When the event closes— usually around 2 p.m. — Rogers, his wife, and any children or grandchildren tidy up before heading home for a no‑turkey family supper.
“We usually have baked ziti and meatballs. Some kind of Italian food, because we’re tired of smelling and looking at turkeys. We’ve been in turkey mode up to the elbows for weeks at that point.”
He admits the day’s weariness is real, but there’s no other way he’d exchange it for.
“We were built to share. We were built to be brothers and sisters— we are brothers and sisters. Kindness and service and sharing is our natural environment, and we’ve gotten away from that. Give your time away and just keep it simple. That’s what I’ve seen from the generosity of so many wonderful people.”
Let her cook
More than a decade after starting her culinary career, Hav & Mar executive chef Fariyal Abdullahi, 39, said she’s used to spending Thanksgiving and other holidays in a restaurant. Dan Chen
For 39‑year‑old executive chef Fariyal Abdullahi, head‑to‑head at the trendy Chelsea seafood spot Hav & Mar, a busy Thanksgiving day feels natural.
Now in her thirteenth year rising through the culinary ranks— after sharpening her skills at the world’s 50 Best list and Michelin‑starred Noma in Copenhagen, and even working the 2021 Met Gala— she finds the perpetual kitchen bustle a welcome routine.
In culinary school, advisors warned she would likely be on the clock on both Thanksgiving and Christmas.
“That doesn’t really sink in until the first year you’re actually working professionally in a kitchen,” Abdullahi told The Post.
But the gratitude expressed by Hav & Mar guests on Thanksgiving makes the extra workload less taxing, with diners often taking a moment to say “thank you.”
“No one’s ever in a bad mood on Thanksgiving. Everyone who comes in here is just so grateful that we’re even open… More than any other day, I always have guests coming to say ‘thank you.’”
She recalls that becoming the head chef of Hav & Mar wasn’t always a plan; she had started as an undergraduate in Ethiopia studying psychology, intending to become a doctor like her siblings.
But when graduate school loomed, she secretly applied to culinary school instead.
Over a decade later, she’s cooking plates that weave her Ethiopian heritage with Nordic influences.
These flavors mirror those of chef Marcus Samuelsson, who named the restaurant—a nod to the Swedish word for ocean (“hav”) and the Amharic word for honey (“mar”).
Although the menu originally featured seafood only, it has expanded to highlight the narratives of many immigrant communities.
“I have two (sous) chefs from the Philippines and they started making me some Filipino dishes. I have a line cook who’s from Peru, I have a line cook who’s from Ecuador, and everybody just kind of started to chime in.”
For Thanksgiving, the restaurant offers its signature dishes à la carte rather than a classic American buffet.
A small crew—three prep people in the morning, six servers at night—serves up to 140 customers (usually around 80 on the holiday).
Abdullahi calls the team “family,” which eases spending the day away from blood relatives.
Before the shift, they hold a holiday‑themed “family meal,” a tradition for many restaurants to share a meal together before service.
“A couple days ago, one of our supervisors for the A.M. prep team named Maria asked if, for Thanksgiving this year, she could make us tamales.”
The team is careful to keep the environment joyful.
“There will always be discipline and making sure there’s work getting done, but I have a ‘no yelling’ policy— I try to create as joyful an environment as I can. So we’re always playing music, we’re always having fun. It’s a great place to be.”
She hopes patrons leave with a sense of “joie de vivre,” feeling cared for and part of something bigger.
“I love creating traditions with my team and creating a temporary home for people who can’t be with the rest of their families for whatever reason.”
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