Rowan County chapter members brave fierce weather to raise funds and have fun

For the second consecutive year Rowan County chapter members had to contend with violent weather at the chapter’s largest annual fundraising event. The chapter is the sole food provider for the Old Time Music Festival held on July 26 and 27 in Rowan County near Morehead.

This was the seventh year for the festival. It drew as many as 300 people from across Kentucky and several states and from as far away as Great Britain. To see the sights and hear some of the music from this wonderful festival visit their website at www.moreheadoldtime.com. Last year more than 3 inches of rain fell in about an hour soaking down the event.  Chapter members rallied and the event went on to be a success.

More than a dozen chapter members contributed to this year’s fundraiser. Friday night’s dinner went smoothly with chapter members cooking and serving char-broiled hamburgers, hot dogs, soup beans and corn bread, black bean soup and veggie burritos. There was also a wide variety of homemade muffins and cookies along with soft drinks. But, at around 8 in the evening and without any warning, a freak storm came from behind the mountain north of the farm. No lightning or thunder preceded the storm, just boiling black clouds and gale force winds. As soon as chapter members saw the black clouds they scrambled to pack up as much as they could, but within a minute or two 60 MPH winds slammed into the festival.

An announcer asked all people under the circus tents to take shelter. With families running for shelter, chapter members stationed themselves standing on the footpads of the posts of the two canopies over our food booths. The winds were so strong that they were throwing other canopies at the festival into the air and almost lifted our members along with our canopies. Then a cold, driving rain joined the strong blasts of wind. Not one of our members would yield and move to shelter. If the canopies had broken free they easily could have struck children and families fleeing for their cars.

Unfortunately, both KFTC canopies sustained damage to their frames.  The metal bracing on one was snapped in two and another had the metal leg ripped half way through.

Within 20 minutes the storm passed. Members gathered up perishables and covered up for the evening soaked through and exhausted. Saturday dawned sunny and delightful. Chapter members were up early wiping up with towels, splinting the canopies back together for the day and then serving coffee, teas, muffins, scrambled eggs and potatoes and breakfast burritos. Saturday was a beautiful day and lunch and supper went equally well. At dusk chapter members packed up and celebrated another very successful fundraiser.

Rowan County member and Steering Committee representative Ted Withrow emailed our chapter the day after the festival, writing:

“Huge success! Everyone worked hard, and when the going got tough, the tough got going; we rose from a devastating storm without a single thought that we would not. That is a character trait of the KFTC family. We are relentless in all we do!”