Mother Nature has a nasty habit of making trouble at the Burgoo Festival: Some years, Utica’s signature festival is scorchingly hot, others numbingly cold. Sure enough, the old party crasher was up to her old tricks Sunday during the 45th annual festival. Amid what was shaping up to (and still may) be a banner year, a light rain fell shortly after 1 p.m. It was reportedly the first time it rained on the Burgoo in 22 years. But when the till is counted this time, the La Salle County Historical Society may yet pronounce this year’s fundraiser the best yet. Organizers and observers marked the traffic, vendor total and, most tellingly, the rate at which tourists sucked down the burgoo stew. “You look out the door here,” docent Ken Snow said, throwing open an exit door from the museum, “and there’s a long line of people waiting for burgoo.” Burgoomeister Mike Ellerbrock said he and his team filled their cauldrons with 540 gallons of stew, and more than 80 percent had vanished within four hours. At that pace, he projected, an unprecedented volume of stew would be gulped in an unprecedented five hours. “So this would technically be a record,” Ellerbrock said. Snow and his peers are hoping that portends a nice haul because the society has big plans for the museum. The current museum will continue to house pre-20th century artifacts including the Illinois and Michigan Canal and Lincoln exhibits, while the 20th century and military artifacts will be moved into the Heritage Center, or the neighboring two-story building acquired from Utica Elevator. Curator/manager Monica Blue said they hope to have the Heritage Center displays ready in time for Veterans Day. Blue said she was cautiously optimistic the society would achieve this year’s financial objectives based on the turnout not only Sunday but during the Saturday events, which she deemed especially well-attended. “The traffic coming into town Saturday was unbelievable,” Blue said, “It looked like traffic on Burgoo Sunday.” Former village trustee Mary Pawlak agreed that Saturday’s car show — reinstated in years past after a long hiatus — drew “more cars than I’d ever seen” and may have given the two-day festival and early jump in receipts. Sunday, too, looked like anything but a disappointment. Vendors and parking attendants variously described the tourist volume as about average to impressive. Utica fire chief Ben Brown noted it was hard to pinpoint because organizers spread the festival over a larger area than in some years past. Indeed, this year’s festival lured in 340 vendors — up from 224 just two years ago — with many funneled in and around the Canal Market, a former lumber shed acquired with Heritage Center and which offered vendors enclosed retail space. And aside from a few raindrops, there were no notable tourist obstacles as in years past. The Route 178 realignment was completed months ago, ending a brief but unwelcome period where Burgoo visitors had to follow construction signs and dodge pylons to get to the crafts, music and stew. Utica resident Dee Barrera said it was worth the wait. “And the town looks beautiful, I think,” Barrera said. “The landscaping looks great and I love the (Route 178) bypass. “I think people like it here.”
Posted on: Mon, 13 Oct 2014 15:41:11 +0000
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