Depot Day returns Saturday

Depot Day returns Saturday

Community invited to celebration at the Crittenden County Museum

news@theeveningtimes.com

Depot Day is coming back to Earle.

The one day street festival, which will be held on Saturday in Earle from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., will offer fun and games for families, food vendors, musical entertainment, and information and handouts from area civic and church organizations.

“I am so excited,” said Tamara Berry, executive director of the Crittenden County Museum. “It has come together so well.”

Berry said Depot Day started in the early 1990s as a fundraiser for the museum, but gradually gave way to more of a street fair run by the Earle Chamber of Commerce.

The event wasn’t going to be held this year, so Berry and Thomas Machnitzki at the Crittenden County Museum, along with City Councilman Charlie Young of Young’s Grocery, decided to take the initiative and bring the event back.

“Thomas and I and Mr.

Young were at a memorial in April and we were thinking that we just wanted to do something for the community,” Berry said. “My thought and Thomas’s was to do something to get the museum noticed. Many people say to me when I am working at Southland that they didn’t know Earle has a museum. And then I saw other groups giving away school supplies, so I wanted to gather those people together and do something big to give back to the community. And Mr.

Young was saying the Chamber of Commerce lost their president and vice president so there wasn’t going to be an event this year. So we said we will have an event and put it together, not as a fundraiser, but to give back to the community.”

Berry said they have 27 vendors or groups participating this year.

Among the highlights are artists Tim Way, Alonzo Cummings, and Jessica White, who will also be doing face painting; Gospel entertainment from Minister Sandra Anthony Bray of Old St. Paul Church, Coretta Allen of St. Luke Baptist Church, and Tabitha Boykin of Crawfordsville Christ Tabernacle.

Food vendors include B& D Concessions from Memphis, Hoard’s BBQ, and the “Tie Man” who will be serving up sweet potatoes, pecan, and custard

pies.

Local groups with booths include the Earle Public Library, Mid-South Greyhound Adoption, Parkin Museum, Arkansas Geological Survey, Southern Tenant Farmers Museum, Earle Fire Department, and Earle High School senior class which will be selling pies and cupcakes to raise money for its senior trip.

There will also be free health screenings provided by East Arkansas Family Health Inc.

The event will also feature three inflatable jumping tents from Amazing Party Inflatables of Marion sponsored by Pastor Clayton Adams of Earle Assembly of God.

“This is going to be something great for this community,” Berry said. “And it is going to get bigger every

year.”

By Mark Randall