The little market that survived

The little farmers’ market that could has announced that its fourteenth season will begin on Sunday, May 24.

If you’re accustomed to the Kingston Farmers’ Market, or even the one in Woodstock, calling what happens on summer Sundays in the little village of Franklin a farmers’ market might strike you as a bit presumptuous. It’s an intimate affair. Just a handful of food vendors, someone singing folk songs, and the same people, week after week, sitting at tables and visiting in front of Chapel Hall, the stately historic building that now houses The Franklin Stage.

The announcement that the market would open on schedule this year, albeit with some personal distancing and mask requirements, no music, and no tables, made me feel good. It’s a defiant gesture against a very hard couple of months, a raised fist or a middle finger to despair.

The entire village of Franklin is a National Historic District. It has endured. It’s survived a flu epidemic, the Depression, the loss of its children to wars halfway across the world, the abandoned tracks that once carried its goods to the world. It’s been knocked down before, and it’s always gotten back up.

It’s survived Covid-19. And on Memorial Day weekend, Franklin’s getting to its feet again.

Read more installments of Village Voices by Susan Barnett.