Moose festival drops off Talkeetna events calendar

TALKEETNA — The Talkeetna Moose Dropping Festival is history.

In the wake of a raucous weekend that saw an upswell of violent, drunken and unlawful behavior associated with this year’s event, the Talkeetna Historical Society has decided to cancel the 37-year tradition.

“It was an agonizing decision,” said Rich Crane, society president. “We had several meetings with our board, plus we had our public meeting.”

The bottom line, Crane said, was there isn’t enough community support to justify continuing the festival.

“There just is not the support for it now,” he said. “Without more support, we felt like the festival had grown beyond what we could cope with.”

For the past several years, as the Moose Dropping Festival has grown, so have the problems surrounding bringing thousands of people into a town with a summer population of about 800. Those problems culminated July 11-12 when there were multiple incidents of random physical assaults and drunken fights downtown, according to Alaska State Trooper reports. A Nikiski man also has not been found after jumping into the Talkeetna River near the Alaska Railroad trestle despite being warned by law enforcement.

“I’d have to say that, as the festival has grown, there has been more, well, a lot of things going on that is not family oriented,” Crane said. “We support the community. Our job is to support the community. We’re the caretakers of our history. Obviously, the festival could not continue the way it went on this year.”

Without the festival, the historical society loses its largest fundraiser, Crane said. Without that money, the group will seek other means of raising money. Some tentative ideas have been to host narrated walking tours of the area or put on historical skits, he said.

“Of course, we get grants for infrastructure and maintenance of historic properties,” Crane said. “But what we will have to cover is our operating expenses.”

While Crane said he “would not rule out” the festival possibly making a return in the future, it’s not likely at this point.

“It’s just canceled,” he said. “At this point, it would take a lot of support for us to try to bring it back.”