Fall festival closes First Fridays

STEUBENVILLE -- While First Fridays on Fourth Street will close out its season this week, planners already are looking ahead to a special year.

Celebrating its ninth season, the monthly outdoor street fair run by the Harmonium Project will carry a fall festival theme.

“This is it, this is the last one of the year, and we’re hoping it’s going to be the biggest and best one,” said Marc Barnes, president of the Harmonium Project. “We are incorporating a lot of things, like apple cider pressing, trolley rides and pumpkin carving. And, of course, there will be a lot of wonderful Octoberfest beers on tap.”

Columbiana-based Birdfish Brewing Co. will be bringing a number of traditional seasonal beers to the festival, which will run from 6 p.m. to 11 p.m., Barnes added.

There also will be lots of music spread throughout the festival, including performances by J.P. Von Arx, Matt Hill, Elisha “Platinum” Fletcher, DC Cardelli and Big Blitz, Pittsburgh’s saxophone extraordinaires. The Sycamore Folk Dancers will perform, and there will be numerous vendors and food trucks.

This year’s season, which began May 1, was not without its issues. Organizers had to adapt to cooler-than-average temperatures, rain, summer storms and extreme heat. Despite all of that -- and a couple of other challenges -- Barnes said this year’s series has been a success.

“It’s been really wonderful,” he explained. “I mean, it’s been a tough season in some ways because we have had so many parts of our regular footprint closed. First, it was because of the emergency closure of the area underneath the Sinclair Building, and then the closure of a part of Market Street because of the demolitions being done for the new Oyo Brewing Co. facility that is being built.

“So, in a sense, it’s been a little more difficult just to figure out how to fit the incredible number of vendors we have,” Barnes continued. “But, we’ve made it work. and, we have been really, really appreciative that it didn’t cause anyone to not show up -- either the vendors or the participants.”

One of the biggest reasons First Fridays has continued to grow is the continued response from volunteers -- and the continued support of numerous sponsors. That buy-in is showing positive results, as redevelopment in the downtown area of the city has started to increase, through efforts by the College of St. Joseph the Worker and the new brewery, for example.

“It all comes together with the collaboration of so many people,” Barnes said. “I have to mention the immense help of Mark Nelson and his family, who have been here from the beginning, not just as founders of the event, but also as just constantly providing the backbone of volunteer labor -- from setting the things up and taking them down to connecting with the city each month.

“And then, of course, you have the wonderful sponsors and businesses, and the many different institutions that want a thriving, rehabilitated downtown and see that First Fridays is crucial to that.”

When First Fridays was started, organizers said they wanted the event to be a way to draw people from across the Tri-State Area back to downtown Steubenville, which at one time served as the area’s commercial and retail hub. That, in turn, could encourage additional growth, which the community is seeing.

It also served as a way to bring people together, and created a template that other communities throughout the area have used to start their own community events.

“I’m not going to pretend that First Fridays caused the College of St. Joseph the Worker to come downtown, or anything like that,” Barnes said. “I do think it’s important that First Fridays represents a new way of looking at economic success and to say that it’s not just about money, it’s not just about a quick, sure bet.

“One of the reasons to be in a particular place is because it’s a lot of fun, and all of your friends are here,” he continued. “So, if the downtown can be a place that’s a lot of fun and that’s full of friends, then I think it becomes attractive to more and more people and more and more businesses. That’s what we hope we add to the overall attractiveness of downtown.”

Members of the Harmonium Project will remain busy in the coming months. They will be assisting the Steubenville Cultural Trust with the Steubenville Nutcracker Village, which will open on Nov. 24. Barnes said they will be helping to arrange for different musicians and will be doing some Christmas stage presentations at the Grand Theater for the Performing Arts.

“We’ll take a break during those cold months until we start planning for the next season," he said. "Of course, the Harmonium Project always is open to doing any kind of one-off music or art event that we think will bring people into the downtown and make it a fun place to live.”

Barnes said organizers already have started to think about the 2027 First Fridays season, which likely will begin on May 7. It will be a special one, he added, because it will be the street festival’s 10-year anniversary.

“You know,” he said, “there’s nothing quite like a 10-year anniversary to make it an even bigger event, and a bigger gift to the whole city.”