Lumberjacks entertain at last North Webster Fall Festival
Tara Brandon, left, plays peek-a-boo with niece, Kambry Myers, at the North Webster Fall Festival bouncy castle.
NORTH WEBSTER — From bouncy castles to lumberjack shows, there was something for everybody at the seventh annual North Webster Fall Festival, held from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m., Saturday, Sept. 24 at the Lion’s Club Mermaid Festival Fairgrounds.
The one-day event, sponsored by the North Webster-Tippecanoe Township Chamber of Commerce, featured “a different activity every year,” said chamber president Sue Ward. This year, that was a lumberjack competition put on in the morning and afternoon by the All American Lumberjack Show of Stillwater, Minn. The show featured two professional lumberjacks demonstrating various events for an appreciative crowd of kids and adults.
Professional lumberjack competitor Tim Knutsen wowed the crows with a cut performed on a springboard.
However, according to Ward, this will be the last year for the North Webster Fall Festival as a stand alone event. The chamber will “focus on Dixie Days,” she said, held on the last Saturday in July. Ward added Fall festival events and resources will be combined with those of Dixie Days.
With sunny skies and temperatures hovering around 80 degrees, it was a nice day for chopping wood. This year’s lumberjack events included crosscut, bow and chain saw competitions; a spring board race, where the lumberjacks had to stand on a platform fit into the side of a vertical log while cutting its top off with a chainsaw; an ax-throwing competition; and a boom run, where the competitors ran from one platform to another atop floating logs.
Between shows, visitors were able to try out log rolling for themselves, as well as meet the lumberjacks, Tim Knutsen of Stillwater, Minn. and Todd Berard of Hudson, Wis., both highly ranked, world class competitors, who signed autographs.
Haylee Allen managed to roll one of the lumberjack show logs for a few seconds before losing her balance along with Jaxson Nabinger, left.
Other activities during the day included old fashioned cake walks for $1, a game of musical chairs featuring 38 cakes donated from businesses; bouncy castles for the kids, a flea market and various food vendors, including the North Webster Lions Club who grilled hamburgers and porkburgers, and North Webster Boy Scouts, who sold popcorn.
Mary Brower, right, helped her son Evan, left, a North Webster boy scout, take down their popcorn tent after the fall festival.
At a recent chamber meeting, Secretary Helen Leinbach said the fall festival may be picked up by the chamber or another group in the future.
The North Webster Lions grilled burgers at the North Webster Fall Festival. From left are Derik Green, Dan Thystrup, Bob Richards, Scott Fox, Mark Lawson (sitting at rear), Greg Stump, far right.
Bernice Anderson of North Webster enjoyed a burger with her grandson Bentley Malak.
