Historically, the Vandals were a tribe from what is today called Germany.
So, it’s fitting that last Saturday, some more contemporary Vandals celebrated Oktoberfest in the 1912 Center of Moscow.
The Moscow Oktoberfest was hosted as a fundraiser for Lutheran Campus Ministries (LCM), the largest organization that meets at the Campus Christian Center on the University of Idaho campus.
A student representative and leader in LCM, Mikayla Sievers, helped organize and publicize the event. She said the event was the best-attended Oktoberfest since it started in Moscow two years ago. While there were some UI students and LCM members in attendance, most visitors were community members and members of a local Lutheran church.
An overall German theme held strong at the event.
“I think the biggest appeal is that this is a German culture event,” Sievers said. “We’ve got a German band here, we’ve got people walking around in the German regalia. I think that’s a really big seller and the fact that you can get traditional German food, which you can’t find in a lot of places in Moscow.”
Near a table lined with red cabbage, bratwurst and hungry guests was the band “Auf Gehts,” a side-group to the Community Band of Palouse. They played polka and a song today’s American listeners would call “the chicken dance,” which got several children and adults dancing.
Several attendees wore German garb. One guest, Keith Gunther, said he bought his outfit as a Halloween costume a few years ago. He said he has been to Germany seven times, but never attended a German Oktoberfest because of the large crowds.
This year was Gunther’s third time at the Moscow Oktoberfest. He said the atmosphere keeps him coming back.
“The beer, the food, there’s some family here, some friends,” Gunther said. “I like the band. They couldn’t make it last year.”
LCM Minister Karla Neumann Smiley said the idea of an Oktoberfest event came from their desire to do something new, rather than the same old dessert auction every year. When they found out that Moscow didn’t have an Oktoberfest celebration, that gave them inspiration.
“Seeing as the Lutheran church came out of Germany and Oktoberfest is a big German celebration, we thought it was a good thing to try,” Smiley said.
Jack Olson can be reached at [email protected]