MENDOTA – After a one-year absence due to the pandemic, Mendota’s 74th Annual Sweet Corn Festival returned this year under sunny, blue skies. But for Mendota Area Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Shelby Weide who oversaw the four-day event for the first time, the lead up to opening day was anything but smooth sailing.

On Wednesday, Aug. 11, one day before the start of the festival, Mendota was hit by a major storm that caused damage in all areas of town and knocked out power for many residents and businesses including the Chamber office downtown. With no power or phones for most of Wednesday, Weide said they couldn’t really do anything.

“It was one of those, ‘I don’t know what we’re going to do’ times,” she recalled. “It was interesting trying to work in the dark.”

Thankfully, the community pitched in with clean-up and preparations so the festival could go on as planned. “Between the city, the police and fire departments, and community members, they all did tremendous work after the storm,” Weide said. “Our power was back on by Thursday but many people were still without power even on Friday.”

The Chamber phone was ringing Thursday morning with vendors who had heard about the storm wondering if the festival was still going to happen. Fortunately, the weather improved after the storm and caused no more problems. “As it turned out, we couldn’t have asked for better weather the rest of the weekend,” Weide said. “Everything fell into place and that was a good feeling.”

As expected, the number of vendors was down a bit this year. Weide said some of the crafters’ businesses did not survive the pandemic for one reason or another. “Some just decided to quit doing craft shows and several had been doing it for a long time and decided to retire,” she explained. “But we did have some new vendors this year and the vendors were happy with the crowd we had and they’re planning to come back next year.”

Likewise, the parade was a bit smaller than in previous years, but Weide noted that Mendota was one of the only parades that took place in LaSalle County this year.

On Friday night, the Sweet Corn Festival Queen Pageant was held on the main stage. Perris Stachlewitz was chosen as the 2021 Sweet Corn Festival Queen. She is the daughter of Rusty and Jenny Stachlewitz and was sponsored by the Rotary Club of Mendota. Her attendants were Olivia Eddy, daughter of Matt and Kirsten Eddy and sponsored by Mendota Women of the Moose #1567, and Natalie Orozco, daughter of Cruz and Valentina Orozco and sponsored by the Mendota Booster Club. Bonnie Hall, daughter of Glenn and Teresa Hall and sponsored by the Mendota Lions Club, was selected as Miss Congeniality.

Then on Saturday morning, an expanded version of the Mini King and Queen Pageant was held. Since no pageant was held in 2020, this year there was a 2020 King and Queen chosen from the 6-year-old group and a 2021 King and Queen chosen from the 5-year-old group. Weide explained that normally, the pageant is only open to 5-year-olds but because those kids missed out last year, they opened it to both age groups.

Selected as the 2020 Mini Queen was Ava Kelly, daughter of Logan and Heidi Kelly; Mini King was Eastyn Longmire, son of Bill and Kailee Longmire. The 2021 Mini Queen was Paisley Davis, daughter of Cera Davis and Jovany Villatoro; Mini King was Jonah Randolph, son of Josh and Jen Randolph.

This year’s 50/50 drawing was held on Sunday with Steven Valdez coming away as the grand prize winner of $15,359. The three $500 consolidation winners were Lisa Lewis, Theresa Komitas and Tom Valdez.

As for attendance, Weide said from her perspective the crowds were pretty good throughout the festival. “Thursday and Friday mornings started out a little slow but there was still a lot of storm clean-up for local residents and some people were still without power even on Friday,” she noted. “But Saturday and Sunday were good. We shucked four tons of corn and went through it all on Sunday!”

The Sweet Corn Festival is a community effort and Weide praised everyone who volunteered to help make this year’s event a success. “We couldn’t have asked for a better response from the local community along with the police, fire and city,” she said. “When we asked for volunteers to help us shuck corn, the community really rallied and helped us out. It was a phenomenal turnout of help and it was very humbling to see the amount of people who stepped up to help in any way they could. We couldn’t do this without them.”

In 2022, Mendota will hold its 75th Annual Sweet Corn Festival and Weide hinted that the Chamber plans to make it bigger and better next year to mark this milestone. “We want to have some different entertainment and additions to the parade and also bring in some other new things,” she said. “We usually start planning for the festival in January, but this year we’re going to begin in October.”