Racine Oktoberfest: German culture celebration comes to downtown
RACINE, Wis. - Downtown Racine is holding its Oktoberfest celebration Friday, Oct. 2, featuring stein holding, polka dancing, pretzels, and German beer.
Celebrating Oktoberfest
Local perspective:
John Therkelsen, president of the German Club in Racine and a proud German American, helped bring Oktoberfest to downtown Racine.
"We just partnered with the city, and they thought it'd be a great idea to bring this down here to Monument Square," Therkelsen said.
Get your beer!
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Therkelsen is helping run the German Club stand, which features special brats from Usinger's Sausage, Bavarian pretzels, and German beer.
"It's great to be down here sharing the food and the beers and everything that we value as part of our culture at our club to bring those things to our community," Therkelsen said.
Get your pretzels!
This Oktoberfest get-together is a first as part of the Downtown Racine Corporation's First Fridays, a monthly themed community celebration.
"I can feel the energy already. I'm here, and the downtown is ready to show up," said Kelly Kruse, executive director at Downtown Racine Corporation.
Kruse expects up to 10,000 people to attend.
"We want people to come down here and recognize just how amazing our downtown is," Kruse said.
Get your bratwurst!
Along with more than 40 other food and art vendors, the event offers a wide variety of attractions. It comes at an ideal time for the community.
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"With tomorrow being the last day of Oktoberfest in Munich, we were able to line this up with the Racine Downtown Corporation and come out here and celebrate Oktoberfest and bring some of the German Gmülechite back to the city," Therkelsen said.
Downtown Racine has hosted 70 events this summer and will continue to host one almost every weekend until mid-December.
Portions of this article were formatted using A.I. FOX6's Ben Hanson and an editor reviewed it for accuracy and tone prior to publishing.
The Source: Information in this story was gathered from John Therkelsen and Kelly Kruse.