Bump into harvest culture at the Fair.
Bold Life rides the Mountain State Fair from all sorts of fun angles in our September issue, including an interview with mountain-music impresaria Carol Rifkin, a musician, writer, and radio DJ who’s published more than 1,000 articles on our area’s traditional sound, and who plays at the fair’s Heritage Stage on Sept. 12 with Mark and Jeannette Queen (www.boldlife.com/thousand-paths-mountain-music/). We also query Michael Beckman, who maintains some of the fair’s most popular midway attractions (www.boldlife.com/slow-ride-hard-work/). And we highlight the most harvest-centric food booth, tucked amid the sea of funnel cakes and corndogs: Apple Dumplins, a regionally owned attraction that serves apple cobbler and pintos-and-beans (www.boldlife.com/fair-bets/). “We churned our own butter and buttermilk growing up,” notes Judy Long, who runs Apple Dumplins with her husband Ricky. “My grandmother baked two pans of cornbread almost every evening.” Also sample tradition with livestock exhibits, 4-H shows, and the thrills of the midway both old (Teacups, Tilt-a-Whirl) and new (presumably whatever’s going at top speed and turning upside down).
September 8-17 at the WNC Agricultural Center. www.wncagcenter.org/p/mountainstatefair
