Saltsburg Canal Days festival returns with parade, fireworks, cookie contest

The annual Saltsburg Canal Days festival is back this weekend after going on hiatus in 2020, during the covid-19 pandemic.

The event, which features a parade, entertainment, vendor booths and fireworks, will begin at 10 a.m. Saturday and continue at noon Sunday. The largest annual happening in Saltsburg, it celebrates the Southwestern Indiana County town’s mid-19th century boom period, when it was a major stop along the Pennsylvania Main Line Canal.

“We have a lot of new faces this year,” festival committee member Ron Wagner said of the vendors, who will offer their wares in a park and along a walkway that retraces the historic canal path. “People are happy to get out and be in the public this year.”

The main stage, located along Water Street, between Market and Point streets, will be the setting for the festival’s opening ceremony, at 11 a.m. Saturday. It will be followed by a lineup of entertainment, including Elvis tribute artist Kelly Hylton at 12:30 p.m.; The Reflectors at 3 p.m.; Merrie the Clown and Balloon Girlz at 4 p.m.; a karaoke contest for 16 and older at 6 p.m.; and Sour Mash at 7 p.m.

The town’s annual firemen’s parade, best viewed from Salt or Market streets, will proceed through town beginning at noon Saturday.

Also that day, at 3 p.m., representatives from the Saltsburg Area Historical Society will gather with a group of citizens to highlight a new sign honoring town founder Andrew Boggs, society spokeswoman Mary Ellen Miller sai. The sign is near the Saltsburg Presbyterian Church at 517 Salt St.

Boggs laid out Saltsburg’s first lots in 1817, and the town was incorporated as a borough in 1838, according to the society. By that point, as its name indicates, the Saltsburg area had become a leading producer of salt.

John Clouson, 100, a former school principal in the town, will be a guest of the society, at the front of its Rebecca B. Hadden Stone House Museum, 105 Point St. The Saltsburg Herbal Society will conduct a plant sale from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday in the museum garden.

A fireworks display will wrap up Saturday’s activities at 10 p.m.

Sunday’s entertainment includes Terry Lee Spencer at noon and Double Exposure at 3 p.m.

A duck race, benefiting Saltsburg Free Library, will be held at 3:15 p.m., followed by a new event, judging of a cookie-baking competition, at 3:30 p.m. The entries will be raffled off immediately after the contest.

Free parking during the festival will be available at the Saltsburg Middle/High School and other locations in town. Shuttle service will be available among key sites from 1 to 8 p.m. Saturday and 1 to 6 p.m. Sunday.

Additional details can be found on the festival Facebook page.