Music, storytelling, Vietnam 'wall,' Walk of Fame featured at Indiana festival

Joe Grushecky and the Houserockers will headline the musical entertainment this weekend at the 10th annual Northern Appalachian Folk Festival in Indiana County.

The Pittsburgh-based band will take to the festival stage at 8:30 p.m. Saturday, bringing to a close two days of free activities focused in the 500 block of downtown Indiana’s Philadelphia Street.

Saturday’s entertainment lineup also includes a fiddle contest, from noon to 2 p.m., followed by a series of artists performing in a variety of genres: Krazy Kat Daddies, three-piece guitar band, 2:30 p.m.; Jerry B and The Bonetones, blues, 4 p.m.; Eleanor Walrus, a Beatles tribute band, 5:30 p.m.; and Black Ridge, original rock, 7 p.m.

Black Cat Moan will kick things off at 4 p.m. Friday, with a mix of blues and originals. Rounding out that day’s entertainment will be: vocal trio The Bricks, at 5:20 p.m.; the Jason Gamble Band, at 6:45 p.m.; and Buffalo Rose, specializing in new age and folk, at 8 p.m.

Saturday’s program also includes honors for area notables and local Vietnam War dead, a storytelling contest and programs on unexplained phenomena and Civil War-era fashions.

At 10 a.m. Saturday, seven new members will be inducted into the festival’s Walk of Fame, their names inscribed on sidewalk bricks along Philadelphia Street. Started in 2016, the program recognizes important contributions made by residents of the region in fields including education, the environment, human rights, the arts and sports.

“It’s like our Hollywood Walk of Fame,” said festival founder Jim Dougherty. Because of the pandemic, he noted, “We shut everything down in 2020 except the Walk of Fame.”

This year’s posthumous inductees include: Anne Feeney, a Charleroi native who was a folk singer-songwriter, political activist and attorney; Kamal Youssef, a Dayton resident and native of Egypt whose art has been shown internationally; Richard Trumka, who served as president of the AFL-CIO and before that the United Mine Workers of America; Joseph Trimble Rothrock, Pennsylvania’s first forestry commissioner; the Rev. George Hnatko, an archpriest who founded the Eastern Orthodox Foundation and its transitional living center near Penn Run; Jim Thorpe, gold medalist in the pentathlon and decathlon at the 1912 Summer Olympics; Dr. Robert Mitchell of Indiana County, a prominent abolitionist and Underground Railroad conductor in the mid-19th century.

At 11 a.m., officials will unveil a “wall” honoring more than 40 Indiana County residents who were killed or missing in action in the Vietnam War. A joint project of the local American Legion post and the Historical and Genealogical Society of Indiana County, it is expected to travel to communities throughout the county, Dougherty said.

Underground Railroad operations in Indiana County that assisted those escaping from enslavement in the 1800s will be recognized at 11:30 a.m. Dougherty noted September has been recognized as International Underground Railroad Month in the county.

At the Legion post, 534 Philadelphia St., a Storytelling/Liars contest is slated from noon to 2 p.m. Saturday. Cash prizes will be awarded to the top three judged presentations of 10 minutes or less on the theme: “It Happened to Me - or did it?”

The post also will play host to presentations on “Unexplained Phenomena of Northern Appalachia,” at 2 p.m., and “Dressmaking: Civil War Fashions and Sewing Machines in the 1860s,” at 3:30 p.m.

Activities for kids and families are planned from noon to 5 p.m. Saturday in the Delaney Chevrolet lot at 626 Water St. Featured will be Native American dancers, cloggers and “old-timey” musicians, Dougherty said.

Visit naffinc.org for more information.