by Kathy Tretter
The phone began ringing last September with that age old question, “When is the Ferdinand Town-wide Yard Sale?”
The query is also posited to the folks at Ferdinand Town Hall, who usually send callers to the Ferdinand News. The staff at the Ferdinand News is used to it and while not always thrilled to receive these calls, we generally oblige.
The Ferdinand Town-wide Yard Sale has, since its inception, been a project of the Ferdinand Merchants, a subcommittee of the Ferdinand Chamber of Commerce. The Ferdinand Chamber was dissolved, as was the Huntingburg Chamber, to make way for the newly created Dubois County Chamber of Commerce, whose membership was open to all businesses. The idea was to dispense with paying multiple chamber dues and to operate a cohesive organization for business members.
So what’s all this got to do with the Yard Sale?
When the chamber dissolved, so did the Merchants Association. As a result, owners and managers of Ferdinand shops and restaurants are in the process of re-organizing but the pandemic halted progress. Since the Ferdinand News has always been a Merchant member and for many years has essentially taken care of the yard sale, the staff initially followed what had been established many years ago and scheduled the Yard Sale for the first weekend in April (except when Easter falls that weekend).
As readers will recall, the world as we know it came to an end mid-March and the yard sale was canceled. However, the phone began ringing with a revised question: “When are you rescheduling the Town-wide Yard Sale?”
Since there is no official Merchants organization (and who knows whether the newly formed group will want to carry on with this annual event), it basically fell to yours truly to reschedule, making the assumption holding it would be relatively safe in August. Apparently, a prognosticator I am not.
Readers may well be aware the Town of Cynthiana held a Yard Sale similar to Ferdinand’s and several COVID-19 cases are linked to participants. The question became should Ferdinand’s go forward. This happened right after staff from the News called all participants to get updates on whether they were going forward or whether they wanted to change their ads.
Kateri from the Community Center called last week to say the sales in her facility are canceled. I received calls from others saying it would be wise to cancel because if someone litigious comes down with COVID-19 following the yard sale they might try to sue the newspaper.
Initially this article started out urging people to Yard Sale at their own risk, but with the way the pandemic is spreading it just seemed irresponsible to go forward with it.
I will extend my apologies to all who were looking forward to either selling or shopping. But in good conscious, it just seems like the wisest course of action.
To those who have paid to hold a sale, we will hang on until next year (or, if you prefer, we would extend your subscription for six months since this might turn into a paperwork nightmare). Feel free to call the office at 812-367-2041 during business hours so we know your preference.
We already received one call asking what the 2021 Yard Sale dates will be so I’m going to take that chance and schedule. Easter happens to fall on the first weekend in April next year, so the Ferdinand Town-wide Yard Sale will be held a week later (different than in the past), Thursday-Saturday, April 8-10, presuming the pandemic is under control.
Again, I am heartily sorry for this last minute change but I’d rather keep everyone safe.
