02/22/2026
This event, a Windber Fall Festival, is not real...yet. It is just wishful thinking for a possibility. This entire area is so beautiful in the fall. At sunrise when the woods are full of colored leaves and the fog sifts through it? Oo la la so enchanting. Last summer Windber had a really fantastic summer event, with bands and the street shut off and all kinds of summer fun! It was such a cool cool cool cool cool small town summer event! One of the summer event organizers approached me that night in the thick of it all, asking, Why don't we host a Fall Festival in Windber too? I said I'd play ANY role! I'd open my hotel for historic haunted tours and add some signature to the event too. The organizers found it was just too soon to pull off an entire follow up event last year. But maybe this year it could happen, so I'm just floating the idea out there to hotel fans who might enjoy visiting... One decision that was discussed was scheduling a fall festival so it would not be competing with every other local Fall Festival and Halloween event out here. One suggestion was the weekend after Halloween, Saturday Nov 7. And for my own signature contribution as promised? I've launched the Frankenstein Awards Film Festival. I've already gone public with this part. You can find it at FilmFreeway.com/FrankensteinAwards (Johnstown -next town over- had a wonderful, warm town event film festival a decade back. It was a real blast. Lots of local folks joined in. A film festival adds a cultural distinction to a town. I was inspired by their event to pick up the torch and attempt a festival here.). (I was also big time inspired to do something cool that champions those half a dozen kids in every small town who go out on their bikes with epic big dreams and a video camera and make that short first horror movie. It's such a creative step! I was one of those kids. I would have loved a festival that recognizes that effort with real distinction for young people and awards trophies and has some Hollywood celebrity host ripping open envelopes to announce the winners!). Anyway, an all-on-board Windber Fall Festival is still just a thought, but maybe it could happen. Why not? Couldn't you just see it if every Windber possibility from one end of town -Comics World and Lucky Two Coffee House- to the other end with Leone's Market and the Windber Public Library- got on board with open doors, and sweater-wearing folks from nearby towns walked our street from one end to the other, popping in the Rustic Blend for coffee, and then visiting all our other fine local restaurants -Mimo's, Carolyn's, Crowsey's, Windber Hotel, Zeigler's, D'Arcs, Windber Wok, Town Tavern, Bella's Pizza (Bela Lugosi's pizza, yikes!) for fun designed fall snacks and spooky drinks? A historic walking tour of the town? And all those classic cars lining the street? Wine tasting at the community center? A costume contest? Our small town Windber Halloween parade? That fun annual fall event hosted by the Fire Department? Kids bobbing for apples? Pumpkin carving? Bands on the center corner across from Sheetz? Hay rides? Haunted tours of the Midway? Spotting that one hearse that drives all over town? The always fantastic Halloween window-dressing at the flower shop? A walk-in film festival at some local establishment as beautiful as the Arcadia Theater? Venders of all kinds? Gobs of gobs? All in one cool fun Fall small town night?!!! I'd go to that! All just a thought for now... but some local businesses are already talking about the event as a possibility. I for one got a call. So if it doesn't happen, it was still a really neat idea. Maybe it still will one day. So Windber, if enthusiasm builds, count me in.
