Toilet-paper rolls were falling onto the main street of Sterling on Saturday morning.

And so were small screw drivers, strings of beads and showers of candy.

Free for the grabbing.

And in Sterling, located about 23 miles east of Bismarck with a population of about 100, there were many more grabbers than normal.

About 1,000 people, it's estimated, attended Sterling's Saturday morning parade, part of the town's 125th birthday,

It wasn't just a watch-and-clap event. This was a parade that sprayed so much candy that kids, bags already heavy, were at times having trouble cleaning the streets of sweets before the next entry rolled and squashed an inventory heavier than Halloween. A sewer company entry was not only throwing candy, but also toilet paper rolls.

An auto repair company's entry was throwing out small screwdrivers onto Main Street, apparently with caution and not much trajectory. No screwdriver injuries were reported.

The half-hour parade, going down the couple-blocks of downtown, had antique tractors and classic cars, floats and people in costumes - such as two walking tires.

The parade finished with about 100 horses or more, the results of months of phone calls that horse organizer C.J. Zambaum made to local horse clubs and other horse owners to try to get them to participate.

"That's the most horses I've ever seen in a parade,"said Kathy Lang, a parade organizer.

Some horses pulled buggies. But 50 horses carried riders, each holding the United States' 50 flags.

"The horses with the 50 flags were probably the most awesome thing I've ever seen,"said Denise Macdonald, 40, of McKenzie.

Or maybe it was the second most awesome thing - since her husband also was in the parade, driving a tractor with a custom cab that he was so proud of and had made himself.

John Malsam, 85, of Sterling, was in the parade and said he couldn't believe how many people there were. He said the crowd was comparable to what Sterling attracted 25 years ago for its centennial.

In the crowd were people such as Karen (Torzeski) Miller, 67, of Minneapolis, who grew up in Sterling. She and relatives from another state were quick to scoff at any possibility of moving back to little Sterling.

"When pigs fly," Miller's brother piped up. They said that's because there's "nothing here." But they had positives:Sterling is quiet, and only has traffic jams once every 25 years - the last parade was 25 years ago.

Most of the town's special buildings are gone, said a long-time resident. But the hotel is still there, now a private residence, which was built by Jim Olson's grandfather and uncle in about 1906, said Olson, 71, of Driscoll, who was at Saturday's event.

The bank building is still there, but is no longer a bank. New owners are currently using it for storage, but allowed celebration organizers to use it for a visitors center. Malsam said the most exciting thing that ever happened in Sterling happened in the bank when, years ago, it was robbed by a woman. A female employee was hurt a little when hit by a pistol. The female robber got some dough, but not for long. Authorities caught up with her soon after, he said.

Carlene (Beyers)Homsuy, 78, of Bismarck, who grew up in Sterling, remembers other excitement. She said she was in about sixth grade when she decided it wasn't fair that the high school students were getting a skip day that day, so at recess she led a little insurrection. She took the elementary school students on a roughly two-mile walk to the reservoir, where they waded in the water for a while, before turning around and walking back. She said the teachers weren't happy, but the kids weren't punished.

She said she thinks it was because nobody wanted the school superintendent to get wind of it and somehow find out along the way about the interesting details regarding the high-schoolers' skip day - that the principal and other adults had been involved and had even accompanied the high school students on their skip day.

Homsuy remembers hating school, and then having to hate it at home because three teachers boarded at her family's home, which was across the street from the school. The teachers would bring their knitting into her family's living room to listen to the radio. So Homsuy was never rid of them.

"I was not happy,"she said.

But with school memories decades behind her, and a shady spot and chair to watch the parade, she was all smiles Saturday.

Everything was sterling in Sterling.

In addition to the parade, there were food vendors, a pickup mud run where drivers tried to make it through a man-made mud course, a quilt show, live music, dances Friday and Saturday and so on.

And the celebration continues at 10 a.m. today with a nondenominational church service and potluck dinner to follow.

Everyone is welcome.

(Reach reporter Virginia Grantier at 250-8254 or at virginia.grantier@;bismarcktribune.com.)