DANVILLE — The Danville-Howard Turkey Festival kicked off Thursday evening, and one of the events held was the Little Miss Turkey and Little Mister Turkey contest.
Although rain appeared to be threatening, the event drew to a close without any drops falling, and Daleigh Parker was ultimately crowned Little Miss Turkey. Jackson Oberhauser claimed the title of Little Mister Turkey.
The first runner-up in the Little Miss Turkey contest was Cassidy Gebhardt; second runner-up was Kaytlin Bullock. For the young men, Wade Mickley was named first runner-up and Tristan Brady was named second runner-up.
The contest was emceed by Danville Elementary Principal Lynn Shoemaker. All of the 19 participants in the competition were asked to make a poster in advance, and, when they were interviewed on stage by Shoemaker, many of the young people were asked to explain what they had drawn and why they drew it.
Shoemaker also asked the contestants questions about the appearance of turkeys, how many feathers they had and, in the opinion of the contestants, the best way to cook turkeys. When she asked several of the contestants what they would name a pet turkey if they had one, the name Bob was mentioned more than once.
Marti Durbin, who helped organize the competition this year along with her sister and her niece, noted that this was the 20th year the festival featured the Little Miss Turkey contest.
“Sometime this past winter I called and said we’d be interested in running [it; we] just wanted to give it a new twist,” said Durbin.
According to Durbin, this new twist to the contest was the poster element in the contest.
“We just wanted to give them something fun to do,” said Durbin, noting that there were some interesting and colorful posters featured in the contest.
The Little Miss Turkey contest was sponsored by a number of local businesses. The winners and runners-up were awarded prize bags featuring coupons for pizza, ice cream and toothbrushes, to counteract some of the sweet prizes, said Durbin.
“We just wanted to give back to the community,” said Durbin.
The festival continues today and Saturday, with many other activities on tap. Events today include the annual turkey dinner at St. Luke Community Center, from 5 to 7 p.m., corn hold, a cake auction and horse pulls. Saturday’s activities include a 5K run/walk, a fire department denostration, peddle tractor pull and the parade.
