An Arkansan Folk Getaway

As you can tell from the title, this is going to be an interesting post (it might be kind of long also). So, this weekend Margo and I took a little weekend getaway to Mountain View, Arkansas, also known as the Folk Capital of the world. There are a few reasons why we wanted to go there. First of all we wanted to go check out the Ozark Folk Center. This place is run by the State Parks and basically is a place you can go to see how things were done in the good old days. Things like soap making, blacksmithing, wood carving, etc. I really like to learn about these kinds of things and try to do those types of things as much as I can. Here is a picture of a ride that they used to have at carnivals back in the day, it is a swing ride that is powered by a donkey walking around in circles.









Overall, the Folk Center was alright but I had hoped it was going to be a lot better. One highlight was they had a guy demonstrating tomahawk throwing and he would "teach" you how to throw and let you try it out. This guy was alright at teaching people to throw but he was not very good at throwing himself. As many of you know, I bought a tomahawk a while back and have practiced throwing it a little at home (I did not tell him that though). Anyway, I went up and threw the tomahawks (I think there were 5 or 6) and got all of them to stick in the target. I was pretty proud of myself, and I'm sure the other spectators were amazed.

The next amazing attraction on our trip was the 25th Annual Beanfest and Outhouse Races. Basically, they have a pinto bean cook off, modified outhouse races, lots of people around the square playing bluegrass/folk music, and arts and crafts. We did not realize how big of a deal this whole thing was. By my guesstamation there were at least 10,000 people there and there were like 20-30 teams in the bean cook off. They cooked them in huge iron pots and then all the festival goers got to eat the beans for free. The beans were really good. It was also fun to see the races and listen to bluegrass music. I think the town secretly harnesses all the gas everyone is making from eating beans and use it to power the city for the rest of the year.




Here is J.Lo, I mean Margo enjoying some beans in her martian glasses


Next stop on the folk tour was a celebrity concert. That's right celebrity, at least to me they are celebrities. It was the bluegrass group the Dillard's. For those of you not familiar with them (I doubt any of you are) they are better known as the Darlings (TV name) that were on the Andy Griffith Show. As many of you may know, I love the Andy Griffith show, it is one of my favorite TV shows. I even have a lot of the seasons on DVD. If you are familiar with the show the Dillard's are actually the 4 sons who don't ever say anything. Anyway, the show was really good, they played a really good show. They also told lots of stories about the Andy Griffith show and even answered questions from the audience about it. It was very interesting, if anyone wants to know more, just ask. This was definitely the best part of the trip. My ultimate dream would be to live in the Andy Griffith Show.


Overall, it was a really fun trip. I really enjoy old timey stuff. Margo and I seemed really out of place though because 98% of the people at all these places were over 60 years old. People told us several times during the weekend, "I think it's great when young people are interested in these things".