BRASSTOWN, N.C. – The John C. Campbell Folk School celebrated its 50th annual Fall Festival on Saturday, Oct. 3, and Sunday, Oct. 4, welcoming the community, vendors and performers onto campus despite rain.
Crowds still filled the grounds, with busking throughout the event. Rain is good for the mountains, and the festival went on anyway.
According to the Folk School, more than 10,000 visitors were expected over the two days, along with more than 230 craft vendors and more than 25 food vendors.
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North Georgia News — serving Union County since 1909.
Each year’s festival gets its own quilt. For the 50th, instructor and quilter Lee Chappell Monroe created one meant to capture five decades of music, craft and community.
The quilt features 50 fabric leaves marking each year and two acorns for the festivals paused during the COVID-19 pandemic, a dignified role for an acorn. A bright pumpkin represents 2026, and a mouse plays a fiddle. The mouse’s name, repertoire and years of experience were not available at press time.
This year’s Fall Festival marks only the 50th, while last year the Folk School itself turned 100. Judging by this weekend, there are many more Octobers ahead for the morris dancers and rapper sword teams, English traditions that have found a home in the southern Appalachians, and for the local performers and makers who fill the campus. Rapper sword, for the uninitiated, involves interlocked swords and a great deal of trust. A little rain, as this weekend showed, does not slow any of them down.
