Return of Heritage Days adds up to big success

Ask anyone who was in attendance and they will likely attest that this year’s Hope Heritage Days festival was one for the history books as it was a record-breaking year all around.

Organizers say overall attendance falls in the 25,000 to 30,000 range for the three day weekend, according to Jake Miller, CEO of Heritage of Hope.

“From speaking with all the nonprofits in the Square, they all said they had the biggest year they’ve had over the past handful of years they could remember,” Miller says. “Several said it was the biggest Friday, others said Saturday was the biggest ever. I think in all it was a huge success for everybody.”

As happens with every event, there is bound to be a curveball. An unexpected something that organizers aren’t anticipating, but that something doesn’t have to be bad thing necessarily.

This year, Heritage Days’ organizers say they didn’t nor could they have anticipated the crowd one particular guest of the festival would attract; especially given his high-energy personality, bold social media presence and legions of fans.

Long before the first booth opened Friday, a wild man known as the Turtle Man had put a call out via social media to his fans days prior that he would be visiting Hope to take part in Heritage Days. It would appear more admirers than anyone anticipated answered.

Fans of Ernie “The Turtle Man” Brown, star of the Animal Planet show “Call of the Wildman,” began lining up for his meet-and-greet hours before it was scheduled to start at 5 p.m. Saturday. Many traveled from distances as far as northern Michigan to come see their favorite reptile wrangler and get a taste of the surprising town of Hope.

“I don’t know that we expected that line,” Miller says. “At one point that line almost wrapped around from where he was at on the corner of Harrison and

Jackson and almost went down to the main stage which was on State Road 9 along Jackson. “

Suffice to say, the numbers were in the thousands.

During a short conversation earlier this week, the Turtle Man reflected on his visit and expressed his gratitude to the town of Hope and the Night Owl Country Band for inviting he and his family to take part in the festival.

“I’m definitely lovin’ that little town,” Brown says. “It is the prettiest little town I’ve ever been in.”

And as others were caught unawares, he says he was likewise a bit jolted by the size of the crowd.

“When that line got opened up and people started running over to me, I said, ‘We are going to be here a while, so we might as well make a nest out of this,’” Brown recalls.

The meet-and-greet started one hour early and wrapped up sometime after 12 a.m. Sunday. The reality TV star says the crowd that gathered for the parade Sunday afternoon kept the momentous energy and excitement going from the night before with their cheers and greetings as they lined the streets to wave as he rode by on the back of the Main Street of Hope’s 1934 REO Speedwagon float.

Brown admits he yelled “Live action!” and hollered so much that he wore out his “Yay! Yay! Yay!”, but adds it was well worth it.

“We had the best time ever,” Brown says. “Y’all done spoilt (sic) me down in Hope. It was just wonderful.... I love to see the Turtle fans. I can’t even describe how good it was, it just felt good to see people still care about the Turtle Man.”

Matt Lee, executive director of Main Street of Hope, describes Turtle Man as a “monstrous” hit and says his showing, which was sponsored by the Night Owl Country Band, is likely the biggest attraction Hope has had in years. And, like other recent events, it is glimpse of what future events in Hope will offer, Lee says.

“This put a lot of eyes on Hope, Indiana,” Lee says. “Bringing someone people are familiar with who has some popularity brings more revenue into Hope.”

It is that kind of focus on Hope that continues to fuel local leadership’s passion for and dedication to growing Hope’s presence and influence locally, regionally and beyond; especially in recognizing and highlighting its rich heritage and the treasure of talent, history and community it offers.

Miller says the plan is to certainly continue to grow existing events like Heritage Days, as well as introduce new ones moving forward. He credits Lee with spearheading the Turtle Man endeavor this year and says things will only get bigger and better moving forward.

“Matt Lee and the Night Owl Country Band helped get him in here,” Miller says. “Lee has some pretty big things planned so those types of things will get bigger and we will have some big names coming to Hope, I believe that.”

Hope Town Manager Frank Owens echoes Miller’s sentiment wholeheartedly and adds that Lee and the NOCB definitely deserve credit for making the Turtle Man event possible.

“Absolutely, there will be more events of this nature,” Owens says. “Matt Lee deserves all the credit for getting Turtle Man to be here and putting that together. That was strictly his doing and he did a fantastic job coordinating all that.”