Wildlife Festival Funnel Cake Fundraiser
The Pelham Wildlife Festival is held each year on the 1st Saturday in October. During this time thousands of people gather in Pelham to experience the best in local food, photography, arts and crafts, and educational vendors. The Wildlife Festival was originally named the "Gold Leaf Festival" as an ode to one of the largest agriculturally produced crops in our region- tobacco. The name was changed to the Wildlife Festival about 20 years ago.
Every year the Rotary Club of Pelham hosts one its largest fundraisers by selling Funnel Cakes at the Pelham Wildlife Festival. Funnel cakes are always a favorite at the festival, bringing in $1,000+ to help fund service projects throughout the year. In 2014, our Club was able to surpass our goal of funnel cake sells by selling approximately 282 funnel cakes with a net profit of $1,413. Pelham Rotarians also added a few other Rotary projects to the festivals daily activities including selling Crocus' to raise money and awareness for Polio, hosting a blood drive with the assistance of One Blood and bringing in a wrecked car to help talk with people about the dangers of distracted driving and have them sign our R.A.D.D. pledge banner.
This year Pelham Rotarians also wore their "Rotarian at Work" shirts and the cooks wore Rotary aprons. Pelham Rotarians will be back to work cooking funnel cakes in October 2015.
Blood Drive
Melia Davis, John Taylor and Jimmy Godwin encouraging others to donate blood.
Funnel Cake Cooks 1
Ray McKemie, Larry Frosteg, Chris Nurmi and John Taylor are loading the cookers with grease so the cooking can begin.
Funnel Cake Cooks 2
Joe Akridge, Ray McKemie and Floyd Fort are staying busy cooking some delicious funnel cakes.
Funnel Cake Mix
Kevin Brooks and master egg cracker Josh Hoover mix up some more batter.
Funnel Cake Packaging
It looks like Bonita Richter and Cody Shiver are having a little too much fun with the powdered sugar.
Funnel Cake Set Up
Jimmy Godwin is making sure Chris Nurmi and Kasey Conley get the batter mixed correctly.
Preparing Funnel Cake Mix
Marcella Deriso and Sandy Godwin spent Friday afternoon preparing the Funnel Cake mix for the festival.
R.A.D.D.
Josh Hoover, Ray McKemie, Kevin Brooks and Larry Frosteg standing beside wrecked vehicle talking to festival patrons about the dangers of distracted driving and asking for their pledge to not drive distracted.