City of Hardeeville brings back its annual Festival on Main after COVID cancellations
The City of Hardeeville’s annual Festival on Main is back after being canceled in 2020 due to COVID-19.
The festival will be held at the Richard Gray Recreation Complex Park on Friday from 5 until 9 p.m. and Saturday from 10 a.m. until 9 p.m., according to a press release from the City of Hardeeville.
It was brought about to “fill a void” left by the end of the city’s annual Catfish Festival in 2017, the city’s Parks, Recreation and Tourism director, Jennifer Combs, said in an email.
“The festival is fun for the community but there is a lot of behind-the-scenes work that goes into hosting large community festivals that the public never sees, long hours, sleepless nights and constant worry that everything will be smooth sailing,” Combs said.
The festival was first held in 2019, but COVID-19 put last year’s event on hold, Combs said.
This year, the festival will be manned by city employees and volunteers and will have rides, local vendors and performances from the Paul Bunyan Lumberjack Show. The show “has some tie-in to our City’s past history and Argent Lumber Company,” Combs said. There will also be a classic car display on Saturday from Carolina Dreamers Car Club of Bluffton, a nonprofit that began in the area in 1993 to “socialize and share experiences with other automotive enthusiasts,” according to its website.
“The City sponsorship Committee, lead by Neil Parsons, raised over $60K in sponsorship to help cover costs associated with the festival,” Combs said. “The City also uses Atax funds to draw folks from all over to our city and promote tourism to our area.”
The Atax funds come from the City of Hardeeville’s Accommodations Tax and are meant to pay for “enhancement, preservation and maintenance of” historic buildings, beach re-nourishment and tourism development, according to the City of Hardeeville’s website.
A cornhole tournament will be held on Saturday with cash prizes for winners, Combs said. Teams can sign up at the festival for a chance to win. Pachanga, a Bluffton band described as the “Latin sound of the Lowcountry” on its website, will be playing on Friday at 7 p.m., and “Lowcountry favorite” Deas-Guyz will be playing starting at 6 p.m. Saturday, according to the press release. Everything is free except the rides and purchases from vendors, according to Combs.
The Parks, Recreation and Tourism department is putting on the event with a limited staff, Combs said, in the hopes that “as the event grows, more and more churches, businesses and groups will join the City to help nurture the growth of the community event.”
“The festival is only as good as its community makes it, and the more folks that support, the more success it will see,” Combs said.
This story was originally published October 10, 2021 at 10:06 AM.
