By BRITTANY FHOLER
Cove Leader-Press
The smells of bratwurst and beer and lemonade filled downtown Copperas Cove Saturday evening as the Copperas Cove Economic Development Corporation held the third annual #ShopCove Oktoberfest.
The celebration ran from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. in the downtown city blocks, drawing in families and festivalgoers dressed in their best German-inspired attire. This year’s festival was hosted in partnership with Kiln + Cone, and it featured 83 vendors, including seven food trucks, four of which were German cuisine. Included in the 83 vendors were 21 food tents. Also within the 83 vendors, seven were German-based, according to Amy Williams, admin assistant for the Copperas Cove EDC. The remaining vendors offered a variety of items, from jewelry to toys to bath and body to Scentsy and more.
“It’s really exciting for us,” Williams said. “We’re really trying to make downtown a place to be. We’re trying to encourage people to go into the stores as well, our downtown businesses to get them business. We’re really just trying to make it a great community event.”
Since its debut three years ago, the Copperas Cove Oktoberfest has grown in attendance. Williams said the first Oktoberfest drew about 2,000 attendees, and last year’s festival brought in a little over 5,000.
“We’re hoping for more this year,” she said.
This year’s event kicked off with a presentation of the colors by the CCHS JROTC Color Guard, followed by a traditional tapping of the keg ceremony, complete with the popping of 12 confetti cannons instead of the 12-gun salute that typically accompanies the ceremony in Munich.
The Whitney High School German Folk Dance team performed German folk dancing or Volkstanz. They were followed by a performance of live polka music by the Pivo and Polka Band with Kelsey J. Lien, and then the Stammtisch German Singing Group.
The CCHS Copperettes also performed.
There were also several German-inspired contests. The House on Main hosted the Bavarian Attire Contest. Herb & Ernie’s hosted the Brat Eating Contest, while Kiln + Cone hosted the Sausage Tossing Contest. Sober Sips hosted the Das Boot Drinking Contest, and Nelson Brew Works hosted the final contest of the night, the Stein Holding Contest.
For Heike Mathis, who is a German native who has attended the Oktoberfest the past three years, the festival is personal.
She said she likes to share the holiday’s history with people who assume that Oktoberfest is simply an excuse to party.
“Most people are under the impression that Germans just like to party,” she said. “Oktoberfest is in honor of Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria and Princess Therese, celebrating their marriage on October 12, 1810, in Munich. That’s how it started.”
The question of the evening was why Oktoberfest was being held in September, but Mathis said that this is also how it’s done in Munich.
“There are only four weekends in October, so everybody does it on those weekends,” she said. “In Germany, it actually starts in September, too- they moved it up a little bit because in October, it gets really cold.”
Mathis said that she liked that this festival brought the tradition of her homeland to Central Texas.
“This is very near and dear to my heart,” she said. “I’m a German native, and this is bringing our culture to everybody. We are a multicultural community.”
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