On Saturday, Sept. 13, Charleston City Park was filled with handcrafted goods, funnel cakes, freshly made lemonade, and more cans of Bush’s Beans than you have ever seen in your life. Every second Saturday of September, Charleston, Tennessee hosts the International Cowpea Festival and Cook-off.
This fall festival is hosted by the Charleston-Calhoun Hiwassee Historical Society in partnership with the Cleveland/Bradley Chamber of Commerce. Since its inception in 2012, the festival has become an important event in the Bradley County community.
The idea for the Cowpea Festival was conceived when former Farm Bureau President Jack Sanders suggested that Charleston used to be the cowpea capital of the world.
Melissa Woody is the vice president of tourism development at the Chamber of Commerce, as well as the committee co-chair for the festival.
“So, he [Sanders] explained to us that a very large amount of cowpeas were grown and exported from the Charleston area back in the 1800s, and that cowpea is the general name for hundreds, we really think it's thousands, of varieties of peas,” Woody said.
Over the years, the local economy has largely shifted from agriculture to manufacturing, and cowpeas are mostly found in gardens rather than crops.
“We wanted to make sure that we could celebrate this authentic heritage that we have in the area,” Woody said.
The festival celebrates the spirit of community and heritage in a variety of ways. Live music and storytelling are just a small part of what makes the festival so special.
“There is a whole field of vendors that offer handmade arts and crafts … We don’t want it to be an expo. We want it to have it’s own personality, it’s down home, roots-oriented personality,” Woody said.
One unique booth was Fur Baby Styles, run by mother and daughter, Ms. Iva Burns and Ms. Michelle Thatch. As the name suggests, they sold themed items for pets and pet owners alike. Customers could buy a colorful collar or leash for their pet, and a keyring or sticker for themselves.
The previous year was the pair’s first time having a booth at the festival, and they enjoyed it so much that they came back this year.
“ [There’s] a lot of people, a lot of foot traffic,” Thatch said. “And it’s all handmade.”
Indeed, there were a variety of vendors selling their handmade wares: jewelry, paintings, wreaths, soaps, birdhouses, and more.
With various vendors and other moving parts, the festival requires the assistance of volunteers every year.
For several years, helping out at the Cowpea Festival has been part of the programming for Lee’s Event Planning class. This year, Woody, a former part-time teacher at Lee, came and spoke to the class twice. She told them about the background of the festival, different tasks, and logistics. Students then picked up shifts from Thursday to Saturday.
This is Associate Professor of Public Relations Dr. Andrea Phillip’s first year teaching the class. She hopes that through this experience, her students will have learned about the different responsibilities that go into event planning.
“I’m hoping that my students will … get a perspective of all the different kinds of things they need to think about when putting on a festival - get to know the people that are doing those things, and seeing what their different roles are,” Phillips said.
The International Cowpea Festival and Cook-off may celebrate a piece of the past, but it also brings the community together in the present. From Lee students to local musicians, everyone takes home a sense of joy along with their cans of Bush’s Beans.
