Mountain Heritage Day festival on Saturday, Sept. 27, was the highlight of the whole week of activities celebrating the people, culture, traditions and the diversity of it all in the Appalachia.
The event brought around 9,400 people who enjoyed watching different chainsaw competitions, participated in singing, enjoying banjo and bluegrass music accompanied by the dancing of clogging bands. For more enthusiastic and younger visitors, there were opportunities to make corn dolls and parts of quilts, make other traditional toys, get to see some traditional tools and items that now can only be seen in museums.
Visitors enjoyed lots of good food from BBQ, fried bread to falafel, funnel cakes, honey baked pecans and lemonades. There were 13 food vendors, around 60 arts & crafts shops, many non-profits and community members who helped with demonstrations and displaying their own crafts and businesses. There were also Cherokee Stickball, Black Powder and Atlatl demonstrations.
For all of this to go smoothly, WCU had 215 volunteers who helped not just for the festival but during the week and some participated in helping in few activities. For Smoky Mountain High School 10th grader Abigail Northrup, this was a chance to help the community. For the WCU Psychology student Maggie Simmons, this was an opportunity to not just help but also learn about the people and the place she is calling home for the time. Simmons is from Mount Airy and many of the activities were new for her.
“I am extremely happy with the result of this year’s festival. The 2025 event was a herculean effort to keep MHDs festival fresh and give patrons new and exciting experience,” Christy Ashe, co-chair of the festival and WCU special events director, said.
The weather and the lightening put a damper on the day because the University was required to “clear the field.”
“On a high note, it was toward the end time of the outdoor portion, and we were still able to have the indoor concert and presentation of the MH Awards inside Bardo,” Ashe said in an email.
See more photos from the event:
2025 Mountain Heritage Day festival was a success despite rain and lightning
