The Bedford Strawberry Festival takes place in Bedford’s Public Square. There are craft vendors, live entertainment, and food vendors, some of which have strawberry treats. The star, though, are the strawberry shortcakes and sundaes sold by the Bedford Historical Society.
2023 DATE: June 9-11, 2023
Location: Bedford Public Square
730 Broadway Ave
Bedford, OH 44146
Website: https://www.facebook.com/BedfordOhioHistory/
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This post documents my experience on June 12, 2011.
.Birthplace of Archibald Willard (painter of The Spirit of ’76) and city where Halle Berry got her high school diploma….
…Bedford looked like many other towns I had visited in my festival adventures.
But when I got out of the car, I realized how quiet and serene the downtown seemed.
Blaming this on the cool and rainy weather, I continued on…
…using the Strawberry Festival banner as my guide…
…and making my way into Bedford’s beautiful Public Square.
Like any town festival…
…they had some rows of vendors…
…with normal vendor stuff…
…and some activities to entertain the kids.
They also had a nice presentation on fire safety…
…put on by some of Maple Heights’ finest.
There were plenty of vendors for a festival this size…
…offering mostly of traditional and ethnic (gyros, pierogies, etc.) festival food.
And three of them even had strawberry selections…
…like the chocolate covered strawberries, strawberry cheesecake fudge…
…and some strawberry crepes sold at this food cart from Amherst.
But the festival’s main strawberry push…
…came from this area…
…where volunteers pieced together…
…strawberry shortcakes and sundaes.
And, I think, in the end, I still wanted more..
Maybe I wanted more outside vendors to carry some strawberry items. Or maybe the vendors should have had strawberry related products to get festival goers in the strawberry mood.
Maybe it would have helped to sell actual strawberries.
This all aside, maybe it was the initial weather that set in my disappointment…
…or maybe it was that somber music they played on the loudspeakers.