photo by Hannah Reel

Emily Merrill watches as daughter Sarah Anne, 2, tries to stuff a hotdog in her mouth while having lunch at the Lake St. John Harvest Festival Saturday afternoon.

Lake St. John festival draws crowd

By Vershal Hogan (Contact) | The Natchez Democrat

Published Sunday, September 27, 2009

FERRIDAY — It may have been overcast, warm and so humid you could hardly breathe Saturday, but that didn’t keep the folks around Lake St. John away from the Lake St. John Harvest Festival.

The harvest festival is a fundraiser for the Lake St. John Recreation and Water Conservation District Commission, which is charged with regulating the level of the lake and maintaining buoys, among other things.

Lake commission member Billy Rucker said he expected more than 1,000 people to make their way through the community festival during the day.

“We need approximately $6,000, and when we put the pencil to it, we figured it would cost $15 per person if everyone on the lake put in,” Rucker said.

“The last thing we want to do is put a tax on anything, and if we raise enough money we will do (the festival) again next year.”

During the festival, entertainment was provided by local radio personalities, karaoke performances and live music, and lake residents and weekenders made their way from one vendor to another, stopping to bid on items at the silent auction or to make a circle at the cake walk.

St. Joseph resident Marilynn Arrington was at the festival selling her photographs and photographic note cards. It was her first show.

“I had never done anything like this before, and so I thought I would give it a try,” she said.

Down the row from Arrington was Lake St. John resident Deborah Firmin, who was also making a festival debut with a booth selling scented oils.

“I have been buying them because I really fell in love with them,” she said.

“They can change your mood, make you sleep, even heal you.”

Waterproof resident Sherry Olds was selling cypress wood figures, the second time she has done so at the harvest festival.

“The first figures we made we went down into a slough bottom and cut the cypress knees ourselves, but they require a good bit of cleaning,” she said.

“Now, there’s a man in Olla who will cut and clean (the cypress knees), and so we buy them from him.”

If the commission raised enough money, it would eventually like to get a boat to patrol for litter, Rucker said.

“We want the lake to get back to a full recreation lake,” he said.

The commission has to spend approximately $3,000 a year to maintain a gauge on the lake to monitor its level.