Volunteer Spotlight

“I love Hog Days. I love everything about it,” said Kaye Finney, longtime member of the Kewanee Hog Days committee.

Finney said she officially joined the committee over 35 years ago after serving from 1987-88 as an unofficial member.

As president of the Jaycees at the time, Finney said she assisted with both Hog Days and the Francis Park festivals.

“I worked the ticket booth for Miss Anne,” she said, referring to long-serving committee member Anne Murchison. “So, when I was done with my presidency, I told Anne, ‘I’m done. It’s been a fun few years, I guess I’m going.’”

But Anne wasn’t having it, Finney said. “She told me ‘You’re not going anywhere.’”

And since no one tells Anne no, Finney stayed on and has never looked back.

Over the years, she donned many festival hats, and has acted as secretary, vice-chair and co-chair for the committee. She started off working in the ticket booth before making her way onto the entertainment committee under the guidance of Sue Murphy. When Sue left, Finney stepped in and began booking the weekend talent.

After her husband Jeff, also a 25-year member of the committee, had a stroke, she stepped back a bit and relied on fellow committee member Mike Komnick to help out. Today, Komnick leads the entertainment committee while Finney finds herself running concessions and is responsible for bringing all of the delicious foods and snacks to both the downtown area and West Park.

Finney said while it’s never difficult to book food vendors for the popular festival, what’s made it more challenging is having to deal with the evolution of the carnival over the years. As the carnival added more rides and got larger, her area for food stands got smaller and the challenge was in keeping everyone happy. Currently she books about 22-25 vendors downtown and three to five food vendors at West Park.

Finney said she has many great memories of her volunteer work on the committee but probably her most favorite memory is booking the group, The Lettermen, a male pop vocal trio formed in 1959 whose trademark was close-harmony pop songs with light arrangements.

While it’s not something younger people would understand, Finney said, meeting the group was thrilling.

“I was totally enthralled the entire concert,” she said.

She is also proud of and has memories of being on the original committee that started the World Festival Pageant.

As far as bad memories, she has but one. It was a year, several decades ago, when it poured down rain. The water made a mess of everything and she and other members wore yellow slickers, pants and hoods.

“We were sloshing around in the water,” said Finney.

After almost four decades and plenty of memories and stories, Finney said she’s not quite ready to give it all up. While there are days she said she threatens to retire, she always comes back.

“Even if I retired from being the concession person, I’d still go back to work tickets or something,” she said.

Her love of Hog Days keeps her right where she is but she does worry about the future of the festival since many volunteers are in their 80s.

“I would encourage people to volunteer and come up. It’s a lot of fun,” she said, especially if you’re a people watcher. It’s a blast.”