Oliver Springs gets beautiful fall day for October Sky Festival
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Some visitors to the recent October Sky Festival in Oliver Springs line up for food in Arrowhead Park. - G Chambers Williams III
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Ernest Floyd of Clinton, left, and Ray Tucker of Petros brought their respective 1956 Fords to the car show Sat- urday during the October Sky Festival in downtown Oliver Springs. The convertible is Floyd’s, while the hardtop belongs to Tucker. - G Chambers Williams III
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The High Carbon Steel band performs for a crowd during the recent October Sky Festival in Arrowhead Park in Oliver Springs. - G Chambers Williams III
Pleasant, sunny fall weather helped draw crowds of visitors to Oliver Springs on Saturday, Oct. 21, for the annual October Sky Festival.
The event was punctuated by exhibits, vendors, and a downtown collector-car show.
This festival is held annually to recognize the part Oliver Springs and the surrounding area played in the filming of the 1999 movie “October Sky.”
It tells the story of NASA engineer Homer Hickam Jr., a coal miner’s son who grew up in a small West Virginia mining town, where he began building model rockets rather than following his father into the mines.
This year’s festival, held mostly in Arrowhead Park in the south end of downtown, included more than 100 vendors.
Other venues for the event included the Oliver Springs Historical Society Museum and the historic railroad depot, both in the downtown area.
The car show took place in the downtown area, as well.
Hundreds also sat on hay bales and listened to live music in Arrowhead Park, where the vendors were set up with crafts and unique items.
Also this year, the festival featured “Heritage at the Depot,” a presentation of the genealogy of Oliver Springs families. Several genealogy groups were on hand.
Based on Hickam’s autobiography, “Rocket Boys,” the film was shot primarily on location in Oliver Springs and the surrounding area, and chronicled Hickam’s foray into rocket building after seeing the news about the Soviet Union’s Sputnik, the first satellite launched into space. “October Sky” is an anagram of “Rocket Boys.”
The festival celebrates the film and pays homage to the community where much of the filming was done. According to the Internet Movie Database, nearby Petros was the film’s main set for Hickam’s West Virginia mining community, while Oliver Springs was used for “business and residence locations.”
Other sites for the movie’s production included Wartburg (where the model rockets were launched), Oak Ridge, Harriman, Knoxville, and the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum.
The movie was shot from Feb. 23-April 30, 1998, and was released in February 1999.
