Father’s Day was no holiday for Joe “Dixie” Fuller, Friends of the Festival production coordinator, and Chip Baker, Riverbend Festival executive director.
Instead of enjoying a special Sunday, the two were where they always are at the end of the third weekend in June: taking down the 36th annual Riverbend Festival.
The bands and singers who kept the riverfront rocking for eight days were gone; the funnel-cake vendors had turned off their fryers, but Baker and Fuller confronted acres of clean-up and hours of work.
The two directed a swarm of stagehands breaking down sets and volunteers tearing down tents, even pitching in themselves to get the job done.
Baker rolled the remains of a plastic barricade fence as he talked about the new Australian shepherd puppy his wife got him for Father’s Day.