tool name
closeAARONSBURG — The work in Sandy Dieterle’s tent at the Aaronsburg Dutch Fall Festival is both old and beautiful — much like the town surrounding it this weekend.
CDT photo/Sara Ganim
John “The Walnut Man” Hoke demonstrates Saturday how walnut fruit is smashed, dried and then picked apart for the nuts at the Aaronsburg Dutch Fall Festival, which continues today.
The annual festival continues today and draws crowds of shoppers at various stands lining state Route 45, along with families looking for pumpkins, cider, apple butter and good food to kick off the season.
“It’s the whole community and everybody is friendly, the weather is beautiful,” said Dieterle, who is from Miles-burg. “It draws a lot of people, this one.”
Dieterle has been coming to this festival for more than a decade with her craft, RAGS: recycled American goods store.
“A rag shop,” she says. “We take old things and make them new again.”
One of her favorite things about this festival is the people. She says she’ll often see the same faces year after year in Aaronsburg, and even if she doesn’t know their names, “they’re like old friends. We only see them once a year.”
•Another familiar face, and one that draws the children, is John “The Walnut Man” Hoke, who parks his pickup truck filled with walnut fruit that needs to be smashed.
Hoke explained the process again and again to people wondering why he was smashing his big pile of fruit.
His lessons benefit the Aaronsburg Area Public Library.
“This is definitely not money making,” he said, smiling. “If I was doing this for a living, I’d starve, ’cause there’s too much work.”
•For 9-year-old Chase Gut-shall, wheeling two plump pumpkins around will be rewarded at the end of the day when he gets to carve them up for Halloween.
They’ll stop and get bandages on the way home, his mother joked, as his sister explained she wants him to carve a zigzag mouth on hers.
•New to the festival this year, Charlene Cella, of Loganton, had a sweet lesson for customers at her stand. She sells honey products and offers a free chance to watch the bees that produce it.
“The observation hive shows how the bees work,” Cella said. “It shows people how bees are so important.”
•At the pony rides, Da White, camping in town from Harrisburg, was one of the few adults to take the trip around the course.
Cameron Barr, 6, and sister Brooke Barr, 2, smiled riding past White, who said it was scarier than a roller coaster.
Next, bystanders joked, she should ride a tractor.
Sara Ganim can be reached at 231-4616.
In Print
@Nyx.CommentBody@