Haymaker Market Blossoms Schedule (10am-12pm under the bridge)
August 28 – SEE, SEEd bombs
September 4 – KSU Child Development Center/CFC, Cooking with kids
September 11 – SEE, 60 Second Newspaper Hats
September 25 – Holden School Garden Project – activity TBA
October 30 – KSU Child Development Center/CFC, Cooking with kids

If you or your organization would like more information about sponsoring an activity for children at the market, please contact Kelly Ferry at haymakermarket@gmail.com.

Also on the 28th, a group of local artists, led by Cheril Walker of UpcycledDenim, will sell handmade shopping bags that are works of art made from repurposed denim. Bags cost $15 and all proceeds will benefit Kent Social Services.

This week’s musical act in the ongoing Music at the Market series is Vagrant Revival, a folk rock group, performing from 10am-12pm under the bridge. OSU County Extension will also be on hand to answer food safety and home canning questions.

We hope to see you there!

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Projected market mural- Haymaker Farmers' Market

The Kent market is in the midst of its 18th year having begun in 1992 making it the first public farmers’ market in the area. 2010 marks a record year both in terms of diversity and number of vendors as well as in attendance by the public. According to the market manager,  the Music @ the Market series spotlighting local musicians and the now completed market bench project have contributed to market growth in recent years. The music series has been partially funded through the city of Kent’s Celebrate Kent! grant.

Fritz Seefeldt

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Rafael Rodriguez at Haymaker 26 June 2010

Most of our vendors sold out early or were left with only scraps on their tables by market’s end at 1:00 this past Saturday.  Rafael, still grinning about Spain’s 2-0 win over Chile in the World Cup this past week was able to find lucky homes for his wonderful breads before noon.  He said that he didn’t understand why it took so long this week, he is usually done by shortly after 11 am.  I reminded him that  pride goeth before a fall, and how easily the long-shot Swiss had managed a 1-nil win over Spain early in the series.  The Segovian quietly looked down at the ground and predicted that this wouldn’t be reoccurring anytime soon. Viva España!!  ~Congratulations Spain! World Cup 2010!!!!~

Some of you may have seen me climbing the light pole this past Saturday. No this wasn’t a publicity stunt for the papers, I was just plugging in the power for this weeks Music @ the Market performer, Byron Walker. Byron entertained the market for close to 3 hours. I only schedule the musicians for the 10 am to noon time slot to avoid the heat of the day, but in Byron’s wife’s words, “Once he gets going, it’s tough to get him to knock it off!”.  We all laughed and Byron continued to entertain us all. great job, and thank you for your playing.  This next week, July 3rd, the Kent Shindig All-Stars will return to Haymaker in a big way. The band led by Kent’s own David Badagnani will feature 11 musicians this year. Please don’t miss it as the market joins in the Heritage Festival/July 4th festivities!

Byron Walker plays at Haymaker June 26 2010

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Haymaker Farmers' Market 2009

The Kent Haymaker Farmers’ Market will begin its 2010 season Saturday May 29^th with hours 9:00 am until 1:00 pm. This year marks the 18^th year for the downtown market and promises to be even larger than last year’s record-breaking season.  Over 40 vendors will be on hand providing a diverse offering of locally grown produce, flowers, plants, cheeses, canned preserves, meats, mushrooms, honey, maple syrup, baked goods and ready to eat prepared foods. The popular Music @ the Market series will return this year to host a wide variety of homegrown music as well. Performances are made possible in part through a Celebrate Kent! grant provided by the city of Kent. Musicians will perform from 10 am until noon each Saturday under the Haymaker overpass at the market site along Franklin Avenue. All performances are free, open to the public and suitable for all ages.  For more information about the market or market activities, contact market manager Fritz Seefeldt at 330-678-5748, email at kentmarket@neo.rr.com .

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Andrea Bussinger and friends play at 2009 Music @ the Market

Music @ the Market will reprise with a full lineup of homegrown music performances. Sponsored in part through a Celebrate Kent! grant, the market will be hosting 23 performances during the 2010 music series. Local musicians perform each and every Saturday, 10 am until 12 noon,free of charge to the public.
May 29 May Andrews- folk guitar and vocals.
June 5 Halim El-Dabh African drumming and keyboard.
June 12 Hal Walker folk guitar, vocals, harmonica, banakula, ocarina and khaen.
June 19 Don Hindenach folk guitar and vocals.
June 26 Byron Walker blues guitar and vocals.
July 3    Kent Shindig All Stars old-time string band, folk songs and Civil War tunes.

Bob Glenn, fiddle
David Badagnani, fiddle
John Truitt, banjo
Jim Warren, mandolin and double bass
Rick Feinberg, guitar and banjo
Bob Crane, guitar
Jim Miller, wooden flute and whistle
Jim Francis, lap dulcimer
Bev Klimp, lap dulcimer
Marilyn Phillips Garver, double bass
Ed Wheeler, percussion
July 10 Brad Bolton and Peggy Coyle swing guitar and vocals.
July 17 Ashley Brooke Toussant folk vocals and instrumental.
July 24 Brian Henke guitar instrumentalist, composer, founder of the “Woodchopper’s Ball”.
July 31 Galgozy and Zeleny Duo eclectic folk guitar/vocals duo.
August 7 Lisa and Heather Malyuk, fiddle, guitar, hammered dulcimer and vocals.
August 14 Jim Gill- guitar and vocals.
August 21 Bluestones- jazz and blues ensemble.
August 28 Vagrant Revival-folk rock group.
September 4 Jon Mosey-blues/folk guitar.
September 11 Aidan Bailey Williams-folk indie acoustic.
September 18 Tom Gwilt- classical guitar
September 25  Adreanne Zeleny-blues rock composer guitarist and vocalist.
October 2 Brian Henke- guitar instrumentalist, composer
October 9 Wilbur Krebs- Caribbean sounds, steel drums.
October 16 Guy Pernetti- folk blues composer, vocalist, guitarist.
October 23 Kathy Johnson- guitar and vocals, blues, old country acoustic music.
October 30 Don King guitar.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

We hope to see everyone for Haymaker Farmers’ Market opening day. This will be our 18th year and it promises to be better than ever with exciting projects and events planned all season.

Stay tuned!

Fritz.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Friends,

HFM annual spring meeting took place Saturday March 27th at Kent Free Library. The board of directors passed along decisions which were then formally voted on by the general membership. A new board of directors was elected and opening date and fee structure were approved.  For more information click on the link for a Word document transcript of the meeting minutes.

Fritz Seefeldt.

2010 spring meeting minutes

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Haymaker Farmers’ Market board present idea for mural

The proposal would turn the underside of the state Route 59 bridge into a structural mural.

Fritz Seefeldt, manager of Haymaker Farmers’ Market, dreams of working beneath a new canvas this September.

About two weeks ago, the market’s board of directors presented the idea for a mural in an application for state funding to the Ohio Arts Council.

The proposal would turn the underside of the state Route 59 bridge, now covered with graffiti, into a structural mural, designed by Elaine Hullihen, a local artist and Kent State graduate.

“There will be agricultural scenes as well as scenes from the farmers’ market and downtown Kent,” Seefeldt said. “And it will also involve the community in the painting itself. We’re going to have volunteers doing the painting — citizens and students — hopefully Kent State art students.”

Seefeldt, who developed the concept with help from Jeff Ingram, director of Standing Rock Cultural Arts, a local art awareness group, said he drew inspiration from two places.

The first was a mural by Kent local Edwin George, a Native American Folk artist who received an individual artist’s grant from the Ohio Arts Council in 2005. The mural, entitled “Love,” is painted on the northern wall of Scribbles Coffee Co. on North Water Street. ? Seefeldt’s second inspiration was an overpass he discovered while traveling through North Carolina.

The colorful mural along the heavily traveled Lexington Avenue depicts the history of the Asheville area in what is called the Asheville Mural Project.

To bring Asheville’s idea to Kent, the board’s next step is to propose the project to Kent City Council and the Ohio Department of Transportation.

Seefeldt said he anticipates full support from council. Ward 5 councilwoman Heidi Shaffer holds a place on the market’s board of directors and is already in support of the project.

“I think the more public art a place has, the more it expresses its character,” she said. “It’s sort of an example of grassroots public art. Rather than a statue being commissioned by a city administration, I think it’s very different. It’s more like this comes from the people.”

Shaffer also said the project would benefit the city in ways beyond visual appeal.

“The peeling paint on the support of the bridge (has) really detracted from the beauty of the farmers’ market,” she said. “And I think that the manager was concerned about peeling paint and children. So it was more than just an aesthetic issue, it was also a safety issue.”

Also on board is Kent City Manager Dave Ruller, who has created buzz about the mural recently through his blog.

In his March 3 entry about the mural, Ruller wrote, “It’s just crazy enough to be perfectly Kent.”

Coinciding with downtown revival initiatives and a recent uprising from the local art community, the mural would be a year-round fixture of the city, offering a unique backdrop to those who work and shop at Haymaker Farmers’ Market May through October.

The biggest hurdle, Seefeldt said, may be gaining approval from ODOT, which owns the bridge. Materials will have to be analyzed to determine their affect on concrete, and all specifications must be submitted to the department. ?? Despite the hurdle, Seefeldt is hopeful.

“I think they are likely to approve because there have been precedents for projects like this on public bridges before,” he said. “One example is the I-240 overpass in Asheville, N.C. That’s a federal highway, governed by the North Carolina Department of Transportation.”

Seefeldt said if the board does not receive the state grant, the project may be pushed back a few months, but he is confident that Kent residents and market-goers will see a change in landscape soon.

Contact public affairs reporter Samantha Laros at slaros@kent.edu

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Friends,
Dave Ruller has always been supportive of our market here in Kent and I wanted to pass along his most recent “Kent 360″ blog update that features our proposed mural project. Artist Elaine Hullihen and I met with Dave this past week and discussed the public art project and how the city fits into the picture. There are still many details that will need to be sketched in as things progress, but I believe we’re quite a few brush strokes closer than two weeks ago. I appreciate the role that Dave plays in facilitating positive change in our diverse city and look forward toward more city/market interaction in the future.
Please feel free to comment and reply. This market is about all of you, the vendors, friends and members of our community.
Fritz Seefeldt.

Art Spark…

My mention of the Haymaker Farmer’s Market interest in an art mural on the columns beneath the Haymaker Bridge earlier in the week sparked a fair amount of interest from folks.  People seemed to feel that the Market was on to something good and they were letting me know that we (aka the City) needs to do more to promote public art projects like this since art runs deep in Kent’s DNA — both formally with the art education programs and professional galleries like the KSU Gallery and the McKay Bricker Gallery, and at the other end of the spectrum with a glom of  indie artists randomly found around town doing their own thing in unexpected places (like streetcorners or at the Professor’s Pub).

I tend to agree that the City needs to do whatever it can to advance the arts — both the formal and informal forms of creative expression.  I don’t make that statement to be politically correct or for some philanthropic agenda, rather if we’re serious about selling the Kent experience as an eclectic mix of characters, places and sensory stimuli then art has to be part of the community conversation and stake it’s claim at the alter of eccentric Kent.  The adjectives and descriptors of art — quirky, surprising, confusing, thought provoking, and even shocking — also happen to pop up when talking about many aspects of Kent so in that regard art resonates and even amplifies the Kent ethos (or milieu for the high brow artists among us.)

Our efforts to market the Kent lifestyle is not unique to us — it’s the core of a lot of city development efforts.  Those bold Texans in Austin have taken it so far as to proudly adopt the tag line “Keep Austin Wierd” in a national campaign to be the world headquarters of everything odd.  You can’t help but admire the lengths they’ve gone to realize their aspiration — the video of the 6?4? cowboy walking down the street in his raw hide boots and matching thong did me in but clearly they have no fear in embracing their unique sense of style.

Another ambitious city that has embraced the off-beat is Asheville North Carolina.  They’ve carved themselves a unique place in the mountains of North Carolina that is equal parts hippie and hill-billy – and it works really well.  Great art, great street scene, great restaurants and a surprising mix of people of all kinds of dispositions.

It turns out that Asheville is one of the sources of inspiration for the Kent art mural project that has been adopted by the Haymaker Farmer’s Market.  They’ve got their own infrastructure art thing going on.

Bookmark It

Hide Sites

Friends,
Spring is here, and so is the Haymaker Farmers’ Market spring meeting!
We have finally outgrown our living room and will be meeting at the Kent Free Library meeting room, next Saturday 27 March at 2:00 pm. I am attaching a map to this email with the location if you’re not familiar with Kent and where the library is located.
Our agenda will include discussions on:

• This past season -how did you do?
• our market budget and account balances.
• the upcoming season, mural project and new ideas, joining the Chamber of Commerce, the Porta-Potty
• news from the manager and board of directors
• electing the market board for the 2010 season
• 2010 start up date.

Please, if anyone would like to add anything to the agenda, let me know and I’ll add it on. The meeting should be over in an hour or so, but we will have the room for two hours. The market board will meet from 1:30 until 2:00 pm before the general membership meeting in the adjacent Wiland Room.
All the best to everyone,
Fritz Seefeldt
Haymaker Farmers’ Market.

map to Kent Free Library-downtown Kent

Bookmark It

Hide Sites