Ghosts and goblins, princesses and sports heroes will be marching through the center of downtown Selma as part of the annual Halloween Monster March.

The event, which will take place Thursday, Oct. 31 — Halloween — from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m., will begin and end at the Carl C. Morgan Convention Center.

Shebra Kidd, director of the Downtown Selma Association, said this year’s event marks the second in a row, which will feature a fall festival at the convention center following the march through downtown.

“We will march down Broad Street so the merchants can hand out candy to all the children in costume, then we will head back to the convention center and have a little fall festival,” Kidd said.

Kidd said the festival would include games, face painting, music and a costume contest for children up to the age of 12-years-old.

Kidd said the Downtown Selma Association has partnered with The Selma Times-Journal this year to photograph children in their costumes.

“We appreciate the opportunity to partner with the Downtown Selma Association and the city of Selma on its annual Monster March,” Times-Journal Publisher Dennis Palmer said. “Kidd does a wonderful job coordinating this and from our experience last year the event is huge success. Our staff enjoys seeing the costumes the children come up with and publishing their photos in the newspaper is always a great reader interest item.”

Kidd said the annual march and festival are a chance for the community to come together to kick off the holiday season.

“I just think it’s great that we can bring on the children together and just be a community,” Kidd said. “They just love dressing up and doing the contest.”