From Staff and Press Reports

The French Camp Community Club is now in the process of making plans for the 54th Annual Harvest Festival to be held on Saturday, October 9, 2005.

The event begins with music from FCA choruses at 9:30 a.m. followed by an all-day-long quilt and craft auction beginning at 10 a.m. The quilt auction is one of the highlights of the event, with hand-stitched quilts made by Mississippi quilters featured in the auction. Additional items for sale at the auction include woodcrafts, needle work, homemade jellies and jams and many more homemade items.

The Harvest Festival became an annual event in 1950 with local churches and community leaders coming together to promote the newly established Community Club, an organization designed to promote economic growth in the French Camp area.

Proceeds from the auction benefit French Camp Academy and other Community Club members including Berea, Covenant, Bethsaida, French Camp Baptist Churches and French Camp and Huntsville Presbyterian Churches.

Additional events at the Harvest Festival include story telling, sorghum making, dulcimer music, and quilting. There will also be activities for the children including horseback riding and face painting.

Those attending the Harvest Festival are encouraged to bring a covered dish for the old fashioned dinner-on-the-ground, taking place at noon. Concessions will also be available at both the gymnasium site and the Historical Area on the Natchez Trace.

Members of the Tombigbee Pioneer Group will be present demonstrating crafts and life-style of the American pioneers from the 1750-1870.

In addition to all the activities for those attending the festival to participate in, the Historical sites at French Camp will be open to the public, including the Col. James Drane Antebellum Home, Bed & Breakfast Inn, Greenwood Leflore's Carriage, and several historical church buildings in the French Camp area.

If you have any questions about the upcoming Harvest Festival please contact Lance Ragsdale, French Camp Academy Director of Development at 662-547-9464 or lragsdale@frenchcamp.org.