May is one of the most exciting months of all in our little college town. The weather becomes more user friendly, our institutes of higher education go on hiatus, and -- best of all -- a 50+ year tradition returns to our bucolic Town Common.
Amherst Community Fair (shot from town center looking south)
For all too brief a time Amherst downtown came alive with the sights, sounds and smells of family fun that dates back, well, forever. Especially after dark, when the rotating colored lights produced something magical.
Amherst Community Fair shot from Amherst College looking north
The Amherst Community Fair beat the odds this time around by not bringing on the monsoons. A standard joke around town is if you need it to rain (which we certainly do) then bring on the Community Fair.
Like psychedelic flowers
Although Wednesday opening day did see a fair amount of rain and Thursday a brief encounter with a menacing giant black cloud that issued a bolt or two of lightening.
Late Thursday afternoon: ominous cloud came calling
But Friday and Saturday were picture perfect and drew better crowds.
Friday at sundown
Friendly carny worker helps Jada after ride finishes
My fondest -- by far most vivid -- memory of the Community Fair dates back over 50 years to 1964, when I was the same age as my daughter Jada is now.
My mother suddenly on a Saturday night packed us all in a beat up station wagon and drove the mile up Main Street not telling us where we were going until we came within view of the those magical lights brightening the downtown.
Perhaps made even brighter due to a dark pall that had descended on our town & nation only 6 months earlier when the stunning report instantly echoed from sea to shining sea: "Shots fired on the Presidential motorcade."
And for my Irish Catholic mother a double shock because she had just two months earlier lost the only other man she ever loved, my father.
As she handed each of her four children a (very) limited amount a ride tickets, in the light cast from the Ferris wheel, I could see on her face something I had not seen in eight months: a smile.
And I use that title in a good way (for both entities) as opposed to that scary Hollywood way.
Nothing says small town all Americana like streets lined with flags, a July 4th Parade, or traveling fair setting up on the town green.
Well, at least Amherst is one for three.
Yes the Amherst Rotary Town Fair returns for a follow up engagement this week, just as the town begins to shake off its summer lethargy. Get ready for rides, carny food, thrills and spills ... not necessarily in that order.
Date/Time Information:
August 21st hours:4-10pm
August 22nd-24th hours:12-10pm
Also in time for the town fair, those young vivacious cogs in our econcomic wheel are also returning, like swallows to Capistrano: Students. About 5,500 of them first timers.
Ah yes, that brief period when Amherst town center is transformed back to a simpler time, before the University became a bustling big city -- bringing our small town with it.
When you could leave your doors unlocked at night, buy a hammer in the downtown, or when most families in town had milk delivered to their front porch.
Nothing says small town (village center) feel better than the traveling carnival, sponsored by the Amherst Rotary Club, setting up for a weekend of good old fashioned fun. Rides, games, fried food, flashing lights, and a throng of teenagers just learning to strut. What more could you ask for? (Besides sunny weather).
Forget the economic meltdown, swine flu pandemonium, and boring Town Meetings--the fair starts Thursday! And nothing--except perhaps a Rockwellian July 4'th Parade--represents all that is good with small town America better than a Fair.
