Keene Pumpkin Festival - Keene Center

https://www.facebook.com/keenepumpkinfestival/

They need to put back the whole Pumpkin Festival,  They have made a partial festival that is too small, and not enough fun

When I drove over 100 miles to the Keene Pumpkin Festival several times, it was worth the drive.  The street was blocked off, and the town put all carved and lit pumpkins for blocks and in front of all of the local businesses.

It was so heart warming and sweet.  Everyone in the town participated, and the entire day of the festival, people had homemade apple crisp, pumpkin pies, little booths, and apple cider

You got to walk around and see all of the talented people that carved the pumpkins, and took so much pride into making a wonderful day long event.

About 1/2 of the people had incredible costumes, and the other half were just in regular clothing

One of they years I went, an entire family dressed up as Wizard of Oz, right down to the red shoes for Dorothy.  

People did space costumes, animals, kittens, M&M, characters, witches, monsters, you name it, they had a costume for it.  It was an amazing experiences to partake in this event.

They won awards for the charm of this all put together, and it helped people find and see the charm of Keene NH.

There was 1 year, when people acted up, and they stopped having the festival, and moved it to a different part of NH.  It was the wrong thing to do in my opinion, because it really hurt the businesses, that day was a gold mine for local businesses, and also people discovered the entire town that day, and then came back.

Wonderful people in the town, have been trying to keep it back, but local government fights them, and only wants one portion of the town set up for this tiny festival that can be walked through in 5 minutes.  

I am of the opinion that they just don't want to help the businesses or celebrate such a wonderful event with the town.  It's hard to believe, but they fight the people that try to bring it back.