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I live in a small town and we are planning on having our very first summer festival at the city park. Other than a potluck dinner and fireworks show, we want to have some kind of a game or contest between the five city committees verses the five neighborhood HOA boards. A lot of the people participating are elderly so we can't really do something like a football game or anything too physical. The only thing I can think of is some type of a trivia contest, but that seems kind of lame. Can anybody give me some suggestions? I have three months to put something together.
Divide into teams, make each member of a team participate in at least one event. Choose a mix of events so that people of different physical abilities all get to participate in an event. Stagger the events through the day, but try not to have too many events.
I live in a small town and we are planning on having our very first summer festival at the city park. Other than a potluck dinner and fireworks show, we want to have some kind of a game or contest between the five city committees verses the five neighborhood HOA boards. A lot of the people participating are elderly so we can't really do something like a football game or anything too physical. The only thing I can think of is some type of a trivia contest, but that seems kind of lame. Can anybody give me some suggestions? I have three months to put something together.
I live in Northfield, Minnesota, which has one of the largest town festivals in the state, drawing over 100,000 visitors over four days spanning the weekend after Labor Day. The festival commemorates the failed attempt by the James-Younger Gang to rob the bank in 1876.
This is typical - these town festivals tend to have a theme based on the area's history or industry or something related to local folklore. Lumberjack Days, the Winter Carnival, Oktoberfest, Potato Days - you get the idea.
There is quite an array of festivities.
*There are numerous reenactments of the robbery - which began with the gang shooting up the main street in an attempt to clear any would-be interference from the residents, and devolved into a running firefight between the residents and the gang, which aborted the robbery and fled. The reenactors feature men on horseback, dressed for the period, firing period weapons (with blanks).
*There's a beer garden in the main square, with bingo and the sort of mobile food booths you see at state fairs (deep-fried everything on a stick).
*There's a carnival.
*There's a rodeo.
*There's a classic-car show.
*There's an arts fair.
*There's a group bicycle tour along local highways.
When I was a high school-aged kid, a club I was in had a dunk tank every year at the county fair -- the kind where somebody sits on a plank/seat behind a "cage", and for a small fee the walkers-by can lob a baseball or three at the "trigger" which drops the seat-sitter into a tank of cold water. Building the thing the first time was a chore, but then we used it for several years.
I organized a frog-jumping contest for our Chamber's Crazy Days one year -- got a dozen or so big-wigs in town to join in, from state senators to the mayor, hospital administrator, school superintendent, etc. It was a lot of fun, right up to the start of the race... when we discovered that the sidewalk was too hot and killing the frogs!
Hint: If you have a frog-jumping contest, do it in a shady spot, maybe with some wet grass.
I'm not sure what I object to more - the fact that you need a contest where people are pitted against each other, or that something seems "lame."
What if you had a little concert, maybe by a high school group?
What if you had a trivia contest that was specifically local historical trivia, like who your first mayor was?
What if you had some kind of cook-off or bake-off that related either specifically to summer or to your local foods?
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