HANCEVILLE, Ala. – Cool fall weather (finally!) and well-established side-by-side festivals on Saturday brought crowds to downtown Hanceville for the eighth annual Mud Creek Arts and Crafts Festival and 28th annual Mud Creek Marching Festival. On the crafty end, 60 retail vendors and four food vendors filled the streets downtown, while local businesses and eateries opened their doors. Two new downtown businesses, Mud Creek Trading Company and Rise Up, even chose Saturday for their opening days. Visitors and shoppers responded in huge numbers to all the happenings.
Event coordinator Nolan Bradford told The Tribune, “From this time last year, we’ve got three times the people, looks like it to me. I know twice the vendors and about three times the people, so that’s a good thing.”
Hanceville Mayor Kenneth Nail shared that the arts and crafts festival was “started to bring more awareness of downtown and to promote downtown. Plus, you know, we’re also raising money for different things at the school: the art program and stuff like that. It’s just kind of a two-for-one deal.”
“Commercial Street is full:” three new businesses open in one week
Mud Creek Trading Company and coffee-and-more shop Rise Up opened for business Saturday, joining Trinkets and Traditions, which opened this past Tuesday, as Hanceville’s newest downtown business ventures.
Mud Creek Trading Company, located on U.S. Highway 31 next to The Warehouse Barber and around the corner from the Hanceville Drug Company, is owned by Neal and Laura Watts, who previously operated their vintage record business Blue Moon Records out of booths in antique malls in Cullman, Gardendale and Warrior before setting out on their own in Hanceville. The shop will feature their records, plus multiple rented booths for other dealers with other types of merchandise.
Rise Up, located on Commercial Street next to Outbreak Games, is owned by Leah and Ace McCollins. Leah McCollins, a former counselor at Hanceville’s three schools, hopes to use both the coffee shop and its revenues to provide low-cost to no-cost mental health services to low-income patients in the community. Husband Ace McCollins said the shop area will host live music, worship nights and other events. While all that goes on out front, a family friend will manage a small gym in the back of the building.
Rise Up has the distinction of being the final piece of the puzzle for the Commercial Street phase of Hanceville’s downtown revitalization plan.
Said Bradford, “Officially, as of now, Commercial Street is full. So, we’re going to start working on the side streets next. It’s coming together!”
Trinkets and Traditions, the elder member of the retail freshman class, is located in the Joann Walls Center on Bangor Avenue, and is operated by Valerie Hitt. The variety shop features home decor, boutique clothing and jewelry and vintage/antique items. According to Hitt, it offers “a little bit of something for everybody!”
Nail said of the downtown revival, “I’ll tell you, (Bradford)’s done a great job, you know, and the thing is now we’ve just got to get folks to come in there. Downtown was dead for so long that folks tend to forget about it. So that’s we’ve got to do is educate folks; there’s a lot going on in downtown, and we need to stop and shop.”
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