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FRUITFUL DAY 2nd Annual Colfax Persimmon Festival keeps farm heritage alive
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Published: November 8, 2009
Brenda Smith came to the Second Annual Colfax Persimmon Festival yesterday with 52 quart-size bags of frozen persimmon pulp to sell.
She also had a variety of persimmon puddings.
"I had the plain pudding, and I put nuts and coconut in some of them," Smith said, standing behind her booth on the Stafford Farm on North Bunker Hill Road in Colfax.
Except for one bag of pulp, all her goodies were gone, just three hours after Smith and her husband, David, started early sales at 9 a.m. The festival kicked off an hour later.
"My husband has gone to see if I have any more in the freezer," she said.
Persimmons are plumlike fruit found on trees that grow wild. Since prehistoric times, American Indians have prized them for their zesty fruit and very hard wood. Derek Morris, a horticulture-program assistant for the Forsyth County Cooperative Extension, said that there are two major types of persimmons -- the American, or common, persimmon; and the oriental persimmon that is native to China. American persimmons, which are native to the eastern half of the United States, are harvested after they ripen to a color ranging from bright-orange to red and purple and fall from the tree to the ground. Unripe persimmons are too tart to eat.
"You will never see our native persimmons for sale in the grocery store because they are very perishable," Morris said.
He said that many folks prefer domestic persimmon for pudding because they have a richer and spicier flavor than the oriental persimmons.
Gene Stafford, a photographer, started the Colfax Persimmon festival last year as a salute to persimmons and to help maintain his family farm. Portions of the farmhouse at the center of the property predate the Revolutionary War.
At one time, the farm totaled more than 30 acres. Today, it sits on 17 acres and has 12 buildings, including a chicken house, blacksmith shop, pig pen and tobacco barns.
"Over the years, some of them had gotten in bad shape," Stafford said.
When his mother, Lelur Stafford, died last year, Stafford decided to do something to preserve his family heritage. That's how the persimmon festival was born.
"I had a choice of developing it (the farm) like everybody else does or saving it," he said.
Since 2002, North Carolina has lost 1,400 farms according to the N.C. Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.
There are currently 52,500 in the state. Land and farms totaled 8.5 million acres in 2007, down 600,000 acres from 2002.
About 2,000 people attended yesterday's festival, Stafford said. The admission charge was a $5-per-vehicle parking fee.
During the festival, Stafford walked around greeting people, taking pictures, and making sure that everything was running smoothly.
The festival featured a variety of food and arts and crafts vendors, displays of antique tractors and farm machinery, antique automobiles and entertainment.
There were various demonstrations from chain-saw carving to a Civil War encampment.
Many vendors, Stafford family members and their friends kept the festival's persimmon theme alive.
Gene Stafford's cousins Jeri and David Stafford, for example, sold persimmon cookies.
His 94-year-old aunt, Annalee Stafford Reid of Kernersville, had her own special chair and persimmon-colored sash as the "Persimmon Queen."
Beppie Doherty of Bermuda Run sold persimmon seeds and wooden persimmon necklaces and other persimmon jewelry.
"I love persimmons because I'm from the South," Doherty said. "The pudding is great."
As Doherty showcased her goods, Betty Utt of Lakeland, Fla., who was visiting family members in Wallburg, wandered over.
Utt, who had never eaten persimmons until yesterday, was fascinated to discover how the severity of weather can be predicted by cutting open a persimmon seed and looking at its shape.
"If it's a spoon … you're going to be shoveling a lot of snow," Utt said.
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