Good to have NIBROC back after a two-year COVID hiatus

From my perspective, our local fairs and festivals are a lot like grandparents getting visits from their grandchildren. I am happy to see them come. I am happy to see them go…LOL.

NIBROC 2021 has now come and gone, and it was great to see its return after a two-year hiatus.

It was good to see people back out mixing and mingling at an outdoor festival.

No, it wasn’t quite as grand as it has been in past years with no nationally known musical acts performing, no car show, and no Miss NIBROC pageant, but this was still a great event.

The sand volleyball tournament brought out numerous people as always. This is an interesting event to watch with a lot of great play.

The sand volleyball courts, which are right next to the News Journal’s back parking lot, are constantly in use all summer long, and that carried over to this year’s NIBROC tournament.

The cornhole tournament seemed to draw a big crowd and multiple participants over at Tomahawks. 

Numerous people turned out all festival long to enjoy the rides, which were set up on Depot Street.

As always, the food was great whether it was the ribeye steak sandwich from the Whitley County Cattlemen’s Association or the barbecue sandwich I had from Dorthae Pentecostal Church’s booth. (I always try to frequent local food vendors during festivals, which are often local non-profits raising money for a good cause.)

Austin City Saloon also featured a nice chicken leg lunch basket that I had Friday for lunch complete with two chicken legs and fries. 

My congratulations to the organizers of the 2021 NIBROC celebration. I don’t think most people realize how much work goes into an event like this, or how long the planning takes.

I overheard one event organizer jokingly tell Southern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Bruce Carpenter that he needed to get up with him in April about next year’s event.

Bruce’s reaction was essentially, “Seriously! Get up with me in April about this next year!”

Kudos also go out to the work release guys at the Whitley County Detention Center, who were down working on Main Street Sunday morning cleaning things up and helping to remove the seating and the stage. They got it looking good.

The same holds true for Corbin Public Works employees and everyone else, who helped pick-up, clean out, and all of the other little stuff that made this year’s event successful. All of you did great work.

Now to touch on a couple of other topics before I conclude this column.

• Next stop on my local event schedule is Old Fashioned Trading Days in Williamsburg in September.

• Speaking of Williamsburg, work seems to be proceeding nicely to renovate the old Merry’s Flower Shop building, which is being turned into another Austin City Saloon. Also, the “Why Whitley” project to put a stage, seating and lightning at the corner of Main and Third streets is proceeding nicely.

There is a lot of potential for this space in downtown Williamsburg. It will be interesting to see how it is used.

• Fall is coming and that means football is almost upon us (much to my wife’s chagrin…LOL).

I saw a couple of things in the Lexington Herald Leader recently that caught my eye.

In its preseason rankings, the Herald Leader has Williamsburg High School picked as the sixth best team in the state in class 1A, and Corbin High School picked as the fourth best team in class 4A.

This should be an interesting year to watch local football.

Barring major injuries, there is a realistic chance that we could have not one, but two local teams competing for a state championship.