The Sounds of Summer

Fair and festival season is here.
What will you discover?

There are some sounds that stick with you.

For me, one of them is the music from the square dancing at the Prairie Grove Clothesline Fair. Last year, I spent much of Labor Day weekend listening to catchy tunes like “I'll Fly Away” as dancers moved through their routines. By the end of the weekend, the music was still running through my head.

The dancers themselves are hard to forget, too. Little kids in matching poofy skirts – bubble braids, bows and bandanas all around. You could tell they were having so much fun, and their parents looked so proud watching them. It all left me with such a sense of joy.

Many of us are familiar with square dancing only because we did it for a week in elementary gym class. For outsiders, it may seem unusual. For locals, it's simply part of growing up. You can read more about the square-dancing tradition in Prairie Grove on pages 6 and 7 and test your Clothesline Fair knowledge with a few fun facts from Shiloh Museum of Ozark History on pages 8 and 9.

Also on pages 8 and 9, you'll meet some of the people behind annual events that help define our communities, including Jettie Franco, who's helped make the famous spaghetti dinners at the Tontitown Grape Festival for over 60 years, and Wyn Yancey, who has learned lessons about patience and kindness from the chickens and sheep she shows at the Madison County Fair.

At Ozarks Connections, we want to do more than simply tell you when and where events happen. We want to introduce you to the people behind them and explain what makes these gatherings worth returning to year after year. Whether you're a lifelong attendee or someone looking for a new weekend adventure, we hope this issue gives you a reason to explore a little closer to home. You might discover a new favorite event.

Or at the very least, you might leave with a toe-tapping tune stuck in your head.

Amy Merck
Editor