Catoctin Colorfest draws massive crowds to Thurmont

Oct. 9—Beyond the fascinating crafts and displays, the endless variety of food and the sea of humanity, it's the Thurmont area that has drawn Melia Peisinger, 60, and her family to Catoctin Colorfest for more than a generation.

"It's just beautiful, with the changing of the leaves and just to see the mountains when you're driving up here," said Peisinger, a Baltimore resident. "It's just a beautiful, surreal type of area. And everyone is very friendly. It's just a nice community."

The annual Catoctin Colorfest, which sprawls through the entire town of Thurmont and into the surrounding area, returned on Saturday.

The festival, which according to Carol Robertson, president of the Catoctin Colorfest, featured roughly 250 different vendors and drew well over 100,000 visitors to a town of 6,000. The festival continues Sunday.

Peisinger and her family have regularly attended the festival since her daughter-in-law, Rachel Peisinger, 39, was just a child.

On Saturday, they went to the festival with Peisinger's teenage children, who were off exploring on their own.

"It's just so much fun," said Melia Peisinger's husband, Don Baker, 64. "There's always something new, there's new crafts to look at and, you know, maybe buy as you're looking."

"I like homemade stuff, too," Rachel Peisinger said. "Small businesses are good to support, so this is a good event for that."

"And the food," Melia said. "It's like something for everyone here. You don't know what to buy first."

Robertson, who has served as the festival's president for more than a decade, said the festival draws a great deal of attention to the small community of Thurmont.

Robertson has been involved with the festival in various capacities for the last 35 years, she said.

"The crowd is out and everybody's in a really good mood. And I think they're just happy to be here," Robertson said.

Robertson directs vendor fees toward scholarships for seniors graduating from Catoctin High School. She put $11,000 toward the scholarships this year, she said.

The festival also raises money for the town's food bank, the Community Ambulance Service and other organizations.

The festival brings vendors, who travel from as far as California, to Thurmont's hotels and restaurants for the weekend, too.

Some of the vendors have been attending the festival for years. And most, Robertson said, traveled from outside Frederick County.

Saturday was the fourth time that Noel Gregory, 52, and his wife, Ericka, 50, made the three-plus hour trip from Maplewood, New Jersey to Thurmont for the festival.

When asked what has kept them coming back year after year, Ericka Gregory said, "The people." She has family in the area, but she and her husband would make the trip even if that wasn't the case, she said.

"We have a really good time," Ericka Gregory said.

Noel Gregory owns and, with Ericka's help, operates TieBro Handmade Bow Ties, which offers spiffy bow ties in just about any color or design imaginable — from professional sports teams and colleges across the county to superheroes, cartoons, country flags, funny sayings and countless other designs.

The Gregory's don't limit their clientele to humans, either, as evident from the banner draped in front of their white festival tent, which read "Bow ties for People and Pets."

Their setup included a selection of bow ties specifically for dogs.

"During the pandemic, everyone got a pet," Ericka Gregory said. "It was the big thing, and we were like, 'let's just go with it.'"

As a special education teacher, Noel Gregory dresses up each day because he believes it's important for the students to see a male role model dress professionally.

One day, Gregory's students asked him why bow ties weren't a part of his wardrobe. He decided to buy a shirt from a thrift store and cut it into a bow tie.

"it just kind of took off from there," Ericka Gregory said.

Over time, the bow ties became an incentive for Noel Gregory's students to behave well. His students can accrue credits for good behavior that they can use to purchase one of their teacher's bow ties.

"They affected actual behavior in our school," Noel Gregory said. "Some kids are like, 'Let me behave a little better because I want that bowtie.'"

Ericka Gregory's professional background is in marketing, so she said that her mind went to different ways that she and her husband could turn a profit from the bow ties.

They've been selling the bow ties for seven years now, she said.

For other vendors, like Global Treasures Handmade Coin Jewelry, Saturday was their first time at the festival.

"It's been great," said Kim Coleman, who co-owns the business. "People are friendly. It's been super crowded. My only complaint is all the food lines are very packed."

Coleman and her business partner and longtime friend, Jody Hess made the roughly 50-minute-long drive south from Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania to Thurmont after hearing rave reviews about Catoctin Colorfest from vendors at other festivals.

Coleman, 50, and Hess, 51, go way back. They attended grade school together and now live on the same street. And Coleman married Hess's cousin, so being business partners wasn't the only thing bringing them together.

The pair has made jewelry together for the last decade, but they only began utilizing coins four years ago.

"It's something unique," Coleman said. "When we wanted to get into some of these craft shows, some of the things that we were doing [were] not unique. It was like a bead on a string."

Their coins come from all over, too — Australia, Iceland, Japan, Canada, Taiwan, Ireland and even the New York subway tunnels. Along with Irish coins, jewelry from New York subway tokens are Global Treasure's most popular creations.

Currency the U.S. Mint stopped producing many decades ago, like Mercury dimes and Buffalo nickels, are part of their collection too.

Some coins come as gifts from family who've been traveling or acquaintances at craft festivals, and others come from online purchases.

Coleman and Hess turn the coins into necklaces, bracelets, earrings and rings that feature a variety of designs.

Once the vendors leave at the end of the weekend, they'll receive a package with their application to return for next year's festival.

Robertson said she expects that she'll receive some applications back by next week. She anticipated that those staying in hotels may book their rooms for next year on their way out, too.

"It never ends," Robertson said of the festival. "It just keeps rollin, rollin, rollin."

Follow Jack Hogan on Twitter: @jckhogan