Nappanee Advance-News, Volume 129, Number 29, Nappanee, Elkhart County, 20 July 2006 — Page 15

ARTS & CRAFTS, Continued from

year, and they are able to make suggestions for the flow of traffic off of the highway, and we make suggestions from inside the festival," Once inside the festival, visitors are free to check out any of the marketplace booths or they may even see the entertainment come to thertt. For many visitors, Jerry Brown and his monkey grinder, Dango, provided some entertainment. "Jerry is a good example of how we get people from all over to take part in the festival," Pletcher said. "Dan Barth does the medicine show here, and has been with us for a while. We used to have a monkey grinder here, but haven't in the past few years. I told Dan that we needed a monkey grinder, and he runs across Jerry at different shows at let him know." Like the entertainment, the exhibitors are comprised mainly of Arts & Crafts Festival veterans. Last year's winner of the Best of Show for two-dimensional art, Charles Sizemore, is a 28year veteran of the festival. "He was a high school chemistry teacher for 28 years, and now he comes here," Pletcher

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said of the Crete, 111. native. "He won Best of Show in 1987, and won it again this year." For winning Best of Show, Sizemore and three-dimension-al winner Dawn Kizar of Racine, Wise., both took home checks for $1,500. Amish Acres pays $1,500 for the pieces of art, regardless of the actual price for the piece. "This is the cream of the crop, of the cream of the crop," Jenni Wysong said before distributing the checks to the top two winners at the festival. Amish Acres distributed SIO,OOO in cash prizes in 2005, not only for pieces of art, but also on the look of the artist's booth. First place winners of the booth presentations received SIOO, but this year, the first place award was SI,OOO. "It gives it more credibility," Pletcher said about the award for booth presentation. Credibility isn't something that the Arts & Crafts Festival is lacking, with it taking third place on Sunshine Artist Magazine's list of the Top 15 festivals. r ' "When the magazine first came out, it had a list of the Top 200," Pletcher said. "It then cut it down to the Top 15, and we went from 15 to 12 to eight and

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Page 4

now three. With a year of rain though, I think we may slide, because they base the rankings on sells." Along with the Sunshine's ranking, the festival was also named among the Top 15 festivals to visit this summer in Newsweek. "They had a Tip Sheet inside June 12 (2005) issue, with the top 15 festivals to visit, and we're the only arts and crafts festival on it," Pletcher said. The exposure given to the festival from the magazines may be a help, but Amish Acres also does its fair share of promoting the festival itself. "We spend more advertising dollars than anyone in this business," Pletcher said. "We really gear it towards the Midwest." As it turns out, sometimes the festival's best advertise-

ments is local word of mouth. "You'd be amazed at how many family and friend reunions are planned for this weekend," Pletcher said.

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ADVANCE NEWS PHOTO/A.W. GADSON Jerry Brown and his monkey, Dango, play with a youngster at last year's Arts & Crafts Festival at Amish Acres.