Huckleberry Festival

The banners for the 2026 Huckleberry Festival hung on Main Street, which in North Powder is also Second Street. The mayor’s July newsletter credited Don, the public works director, with the flags and flower baskets. On Saturday, July 25, the North Powder Community Church served a community breakfast from 7 to 10 a.m. At the same hour, runners registered for the fun run at CJ’s Country Store, and the race followed. A burn ban was in effect, and the day ran through heat and wildfire smoke. The U.S. Forest Service, Wallowa-Whitman National Forest, was on site with fire information.

Milkshakes at the Grange

About 30 vendors kept their booths open from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., festival chair Bonnie Finley told the Baker City Herald. The visiting food and drink vendors were The Rustic Nail Mobile Bar, Spud Guts and MC Taco Bus. Local places also served food: Happy Campers Mini Mart, CJ’s Country Store, North Powder Cafe and Wolf Creek Grange. Finley called the grange’s offerings “very huckleberry centric,” and on the day the festival’s page announced huckleberry milkshakes there. Fresh huckleberries were also for sale. A beer garden with live music ran all day, with McBride and the Current on the bill, and Finley said there were plenty of shady places to escape the heat.

The North Powder City Library held a book sale from 9 a.m. to noon in a building whose ground was broken May 15, 2025. “Our new library is open and showcasing the building,” Finley said. The library made money on the sale and put a float in the parade. Across town a city-wide yard sale ran all day. Show ‘n’ shine cars came in from 10 a.m. until the awards at 2. A booth for children charged nothing, though the organizers announced the night before that there would be no face painting. Each year the festival raises money for a cause, and in 2026 the beneficiary was the North Powder Food Bank.

The parade moved at 11 a.m. behind its grand marshal, Lance Dixon. At 7 p.m. the street dance began, with live music by I4NI until 11, and Dochos Hot Dogs stayed open into the evening. Three days later the festival thanked the band for “rocking our block party.” The mayor’s August newsletter said: “Huckleberry Festival was a success.”

Fire hoses, candy and mud

The parade has held its shape for years. On July 26, 2014, the festival’s eighth year, the photographer Phil Decker documented it for his Oregon crop festival archive, now held at Oregon State University’s Special Collections. His pictures show a huckleberry pancake breakfast at the high school. Boy Scouts head the parade and stop to lead the Pledge of Allegiance, and neighbors gather in the center of town for the National Anthem. The grand marshals drive down Second Street while the crowd scrambles for candy thrown from the floats, and the fire truck cools everyone with its hoses. Local teams played a mud volleyball tournament all day and washed off under a rigged shower. There was a car show with a horse in it and a puppet show in the shady park. Late in the day came free huckleberry sundaes, and in the evening an auction of huckleberry desserts at the fire department.

A 2016 photograph shows the RD Mac team muddied at the volleyball tournament. On a hot Saturday, July 31, 2021, a newspaper photographer caught a young girl reacting as a fire hose reached her at the parade.

In 2025 the festival ran two days, July 26 and 27. Shiloe Weston, who helps organize it, said many of the more than 30 vendors were new, offering “a little bit of everything.” A dunk tank opened at 9 a.m. with Baker County Sheriff’s Office Deputy Bo Hansen, followed by a bus driver. Car show entries registered in front of the white gazebo on E Street. The parade began on B Street with Koy Turner of North Powder as grand marshal, and Red Mabel played the street dance. At noon Sunday a water balloon fight was held near the volleyball court. “We’ve got over 1,000 balloons,” Weston said. Some youngsters found the mud that year, but the 2026 program dropped mud volleyball.

Purple fingers and a favored fishing hole

The festival started in 2007. When The Observer previewed its second year, on July 24, 2008, the paper explained the fruit’s standing in the valley. Huckleberries had been a summer staple for the Native Americans who summered in the area and for the pioneers who arrived in the mid-1860s to settle. A good patch meant desserts, jellies and jams through the winter. In late July, the paper said, anyone with purple-stained fingers had probably been picking. They might say how the berries were that year, but asking where the patch was would be like asking for a favored fishing hole.

The 2008 day opened with an all-school reunion breakfast at Powder Valley School, open to everyone. Dog agility contests were held at E and First streets. Then came the Huckleberry Heaven Parade, a jam session and talent show at the gazebo, and live music by Disorderly Conduct. Lawn mower races ran on Second Street at 4 p.m., followed by the volunteer firemen’s barbecue on E Street and an alumni basketball game at the school. Desserts for the contest were checked in at Cornerstone Baptist Church. Aramark chef Mike Morse, who was also a city councilor, judged them and paid cash prizes of $50, $35 and $15. A People’s Choice award of $50 went to whichever dessert brought the most in the silent auction that followed. The entries became the property of the event, and the auction money helped fund the festival. In 2007 some desserts had sold for more than $100. The city’s description of the festival still lists the reunion breakfast, the dessert contest and auction, the fire station barbecue and the Huckleberry Hot-Rod Show-n-Shine.

Grand marshals and the food bank

The COVID-19 pandemic cancelled the 2020 festival. In April 2021, as infection rates fell in Union County, chair Lindsey Thompson announced a return for July 31, the last Saturday in July, the day the festival had kept in past years. The breakfast, parade, car show and street dance went ahead. The dessert contest was set aside for social distancing, and Thompson said it would come back once the pandemic ended. Volunteers were stepping forward. “We have a lot of new people with lots of energy,” she said. Dotty Miles and her husband, Myron, were the 2021 grand marshals.

On July 30, 2022, the honor went to Linda and Floyd Dixon. They led the parade in a 1926 REO Roadster that had to be started with a hand crank. “It was a great experience,” Linda Dixon said, and she was glad of the roof against the sun. Dotty Miles explained the choice: “They are just the people you want to go to if you want anything done.” Miles said the Dixons kept North Powder’s food bank and Fresh Alliance programs afloat. Each week they drove to the Northeast Oregon Regional Food Bank in La Grande to stock pantries in North Powder and Haines. “Sometimes they make two trips to La Grande,” Miles said.

The couple, married 53 years, moved from Huntington in 2015 to be near family, including their three sons in North Powder: Lance, Eric and Kyle. Floyd, Linda said, “works behind the scenes and keeps the wheels rolling.” Of the town itself she said: “If you tell someone you need help, suddenly you have all the help you need.”