The AUMnibus

Students celebrate the arrival fall at the Harvest Moon Festival in the mid-80s.Harvest Moon festival to make a comeback this November

Christine Kneidinger/ Editor-in-Chief

The Harvest Moon Festival, an AUM tradition that fizzled out in the early 90s, is set to make its comeback on campus the first Saturday in November in the field behind the library tower. 

The festival dates back to October of 1978, where musicians from the band Harmony could be seen in their hot pants belting the blues for members of the audience as students lined up to skydive with the Auburn Skydiving club.

Originally sponsored by the SGA and local radio station Y-102, the event was a popular tradition in which students and faculty would come out to celebrate the arrival of fall in the late 70s, 80s and early 90s with music, dunking booths and food. 

The resurrection of the Harvest Moon Festival is the brainchild of Kathy Mitchell, Interim Director of Student Life. “I want to see AUM have some traditions that we can remember and hold on to. We have lost all of them. We lost the Harvest Moon Festival, we lost Mardi Gras, we had lost everything except for Homecoming that we can claim as a tradition," she said. 

Mitchell, who attended some of the first Harvest Moon Festivals herself in the early 80s, plans to do this every year. “I want to see us get back some of the things that were really fun and that we can go ahead and mark the dates and start planning for. The festival is something we can give back to the community, since we don’t do that anymore.”

Mitchell isn't the only administrator who was present at the Harvest Moon Festival in its heyday. Chancellor Veres, who attended the festival as a student in the 80s, remembers the festival as "an exciting outdoor event that had an old-styled carnival atmosphere."

The women of Zeta Tau Alpha hosted a jail booth each year, where one could pay 25 cents to capture and jail whomever they chose. Another longstanding tradition was the dunking booth, where students would line up to dunk their professors. Chancellor Veres recalls that the professors targeted were oftentimes the most popular, and the most unpopular on campus. 

The Office of Student Life plans to make this years event very similar to those of years past. While they will not be able to host a skydiving adventure or a dunking booth, the $13,000 budget will allow the event to feature several similar attractions to bring out the masses. 

The festival will host three regional bands throughout the day. Rolling in the Hay, a renegade bluegrass band, will take the stage at 11 a.m., followed by Groove Factor, a hip-hop band from Atlanta at 12:45 p.m. The last band to hit the stage will be Eleven, an 80s tribute band hailing from Alabama. 

Festival goers are encouraged to bring blankets, lawn chairs and their pets as they enjoy the performances. Coolers will also be allowed into the event. 

If homemade snacks from a cooler aren't your thing, there will vendors on location. The vendors at the festival will be Moe's Southwest Grill, Boomer-T's Barbeque, Papa Johns Pizza and Sims Snow Balls. American Humanics and Baptist Campus Ministries will be selling beverages and cotton candy to fundraise for their organizations. All vendors will be cash only. 

For entertainment, there will be inflatables, corn hole games, a hay maze, video game stations and face painting.

The 1982 festival saw 1,800 participants at the event. While this years crowd is expected to be a little under 1,000, Mitchell said that through extensive planning, the festival should increase in popularity as the years go by. "This is something that we plan to do every year, and will it only get better as time goes on," she said. "As soon as the festival is over this year, we will immediately turn around and start planning for next year." 

The Office of Student Life is still seeking volunteers, if interested, contact Lakecia Harris at lharri18@aum.edu

Band schedule: 

Rolling in the Hay (11 a.m.- 12:30 p.m.)

Groove Factor (12:45- 2:15)

Eleven (2:30- 4 p.m.)