Pumpkin Festival kicks off this week in Selmer

SELMER, Tenn. — Thursday night is the second Pumpkin Festival in Selmer.

“We have 38 vendors, so we have lots of food,” said Easton Knight, Restore Our Community board member. “Everything from sweet to salty, anything you could want, and we’ve got lots of retail coming.”

Restore Our Community is hosting the festival with a specific age group in mind. “This is a small town. There’s not a lot for millennials to do, so we decided to start having events that catered to that group,” Knight said.

Knight says that all the events put on by ROC are always kid friendly, but not necessarily kid focused.

“Maybe they’ve gone to college, maybe they’ve come back or they graduated, so we really wanna do things that are focused on that younger adult age group so they can come out and have a good time,” Knight said.

They will have games like pumpkin checkers and tic-tac-toe.

There will also be  one-of-a-kind entertainment — a live chainsaw carving

“We’ve got a gentleman who’s gonna turn some pine logs into art,” Knight said.

And you might be thinking Thursday night is a weird time to hold a festival, but they’ve thought that through too.

“We know we’re smaller than say Jackson or Memphis, so we want to give people the opportunity to not have to cancel plans for something bigger than us, but still come and have a good time,” Knight said. “And you don’t have to worry about football, so that’s why we do it through the week.”

The fun kicks off at 5 p.m. Thursday, and admission is free.