THIS STORY COURTESY THE KINGSPORT TIMES-NEWS
Menu will include beef brisket, pinto beans, cornbread, slaw, collard greens, cabbage, sweet potato casserole, buttered potatoes, corn, iced tea and a wide assortment of desserts.
By JEFF BOBO
jbobo@timesnews.net
ROGERSVILLE — Food is a big part of our heritage, and as Heritage Days begins in Rogersville on Friday, visitors will have an opportunity to experience some good old-fashioned American “soul food.”
For the sixth consecutive year, the Price Public School Community Center (PPSCC) and Swift Museum are hosting a Soul Food Dinner on Friday night as Rogersville’s Heritage Days festival kicks off.
The event will be held at the Price Public School on Hasson Street — which for decades was Rogersville’s segregated African-American school.
Thanks to donations and untold hours of volunteer work, the old school has been reborn as a community center and museum with artifacts from the old Swift College and high school, which had its campus nearby.
PPSCC Director Stella Gudger said this year’s soul food menu will include beef brisket, pinto beans, cornbread, slaw, collard greens, cabbage, sweet potato casserole, buttered potatoes, corn, iced tea and a wide assortment of desserts.
“Nothing is coming out of the can,” Gudger said. “It’s all cooked from scratch with fresh ingredients. I guarantee you, it is a wonderful meal, and hopefully everyone will try to make it.”
The American Legion Ladies Auxiliary Post 231 will do all the cooking.
The price per meal is a taxdeductible donation of $25 per person. Last year, 180 people were served at the Soul Food D i n n e r.
“I like to tell people, you’re not paying for your meal,” Gudger said. “It’s a donation. The meal is a bonus.”
Tickets are being sold in advance at the PPSCC and at U.S. Bank in Rogersville through 2 p.m. Friday, but Gudger said walk-ins are welcome.
There will be four serving shifts beginning at 5 p.m., 6 p.m., 7 p.m. and 8 p.m. in the PPSCC dining room, and Gudger said carryouts are also available. In fact, Gudger said she’d already received an order from local onduty police officers who will be having soul food carry-outs that night.
All money raised will go toward the PPSCC daily operations, as well as to help fund some projects the community center is currently working on.
The Tennessee Valley Authority has partnered with the community center on its current main project, to upgrade the Swift Museum.
TVA recently donated furniture, architectural plans and $1,000 toward the project, but Gudger said more funding is needed to bring the plans to fruition.
The museum upgrade includes a wall-sized photo of the old Swift College building, which closed in 1965 and was subsequently demolished, as well as a flat-screen TV that will show a video of former Swift students sharing their memories of the historic facility.
TVA is also helping with the development of a fifth-grade curriculum that will eventually be used for school field trips to the museum.
In conjunction with the Soul Food Dinner the PPSCC is also selling commemorative engraved bricks that will be placed at an entrance to the building.
For more information about the Soul Food Dinner or the commemorative brick sale, contact the PPSCC at 921-3888.
