Potsdam Summer Festival to offer music, food, bright downtown lights

Andy Gardner, Watertown Daily Times, N.Y.
·4 min read

Jul. 7—POTSDAM — The Summer Festival returns next week, July 14 to 16, with three days of events, music, food and other activities in the downtown area.

This year's festival has a theme: "small town bright lights."

"We wanted to find a way to bring the whole fest together," said Kurstin A. Stowell, executive director of the Potsdam Chamber of Commerce. Trees downtown will be lit with Christmas lights.

"Businesses are encouraged to decorate in the same theme," she said.

Downtown will be blocked off with food vendors. The downtown sidewalk sale will be Friday and Saturday, July 15 and 16, to make room for Thursday events. There will be music on three stages starting at 10 a.m. and ending at 10 p.m. all three days. From 10 p.m. to 2 a.m. Friday and Saturday, there will be karaoke at St. Larry's Bar and Grill, and performances by Double Axel at Maxfield's and Divided Roads at McDuff's. The Potsdam Public Library is hosting theatrical performances at 5:30 and 7 p.m. Thursday, and at 1 and 3 p.m. Friday and Saturday.

From 4 to 10 p.m. Thursday, July 14, there will be a downtown double-elimination cornhole tournament. Vendors won't set up until Friday to make room for the event. Registration starts at 4 p.m. in front of the chamber office. The cost is $50 per team.

"In the past, Thursdays haven't been as busy." Ms. Stowell said. "For 54 years, it's been Thursday, Friday, Saturday, so we're looking to make Thursday pop again."

Also on Thursday, the Elks Lodge will serve a chicken barbecue at 11 a.m., and the Tour de Potsdam 5K run will start with registration at 5 p.m. near the Beal Street parking lot. Cost is $15 per runner and free for ages 12 and younger with a registered adult. Walkers go at 6 p.m. and runners at 6:20 p.m. The Potsdam Rescue Squad will host an ice cream social in Ives Park from 5 to 6 p.m. with music by the New Horizons Swing Band. At 8:30 p.m., the Seaway Valley Prevention Council will host an outdoor movie, "Sing 2," in Ives Park. Attendees can bring chairs and blankets. There will be free popcorn and giveaways.

On Friday, there will be a Fall Island Fiesta replacing what in years past was Outer Market Mania. The Fall Island event will feature chalk art and a North Country Children's Museum STEM (science, technology, engineering, mathematics) program. There will also be an ice cream and dessert truck and St. Lawrence County sheriff's deputies offering SAFE ID for kids. Storytimes with the Potsdam Public Library will be hourly from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. The band Animal Crackers will perform from 10 to 11:45 a.m.

A beer, wine and cider tent will be open on Fall Island from 4 to 10 p.m. It is for ages 21 and older. There will be music with Dan Sullivan-Catlin from 4 to 6 p.m. and The Dad Bods from 7 to 10 p.m. Also on Friday will be crafters and vendors in Ives Park, along with Friday and Saturday sidewalk sales downtown.

Saturday starts off with a free community yoga event on Fall Island from 9 to 10 a.m. There will be a car show from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Ives Park farmers market and vendors and crafters in the park from 10 a.m. until late afternoon.

There will be laser tag game in Ives Park from 3 to 5 p.m. and again from 6 to 10 p.m. A new event this year will be a pub crawl that ends with a prize drawing. Starting at 3 p.m., participants have until 7 p.m. to start at Half Ton's and end at St. Larry's, with stops at the Cactus Grill and Cantina, Maxfield's and McDuff's. Each stop stamps visitors' cards, and a prize winner is drawn from the completed cards handed in at St. Larry's. The first 150 people get a free color-changing beer stein.

The Summerfest fireworks will be Saturday night, starting at 9:30 p.m. and will be visible from Ives Park.

"Fireworks in the past have been on Friday. We've heard from a lot of people they want to end the festival with them," Ms. Stowell said.

Go to wdt.me/mJeeph for a complete list of events. Scroll down past the schedule to get registration forms for the cornhole tournament and Tour de Potsdam, as well as applications for vendors and food trucks.