Always Extending A Helping Hand To The Pierceton Community
PIERCETON — The tight-knit community of Pierceton has been able to preserve its small town charm and welcoming atmosphere through people of the community. It is also the home of Pierceton Days, a two-day festival that becomes a party for everyone.
For the past 16 years, the festival was made possible by Kim Rose, a hardworking and sentimental resident.
It began with Rose’s mother, Judy Hartup, who called her one day to say there “would not be a Pierceton Days anymore.” This caused a few towns women to come together to keep the festival going. Two years later found Rose in charge of everything while her family was the committee who worked the car show, making the announcements, putting together the goodie bags and doing all the jobs in between.
The festival combined the two most important things in Rose’s life: family and community.
“This was my last year. I have fought for this festival. Thousands of people come to this two-day festival and our parade is as big as any other parade,” Rose passionately explained. “I want a weekend where if you’re sick or worried about your bills, you can forget it for a couple of days. Some people always say, ‘Well this isn’t Mayberry.’ I just think, ‘Why not? Doesn’t everybody want to live in Mayberry?’
“I’ve met some great people in doing Pierceton Days. I love this town and the people in it — it is Mayberry.”
Rose is so connected with the community she even knows what her daughter’s best friend, from when they were just kids, is going through in Florida. Since Hurricane Michael hit and took away almost everything from the former Pierceton resident, Rose has been taking in donations to send.
“I keep saying that I’m done and I’m not doing anything else, but then somebody comes up to me and I just want to help them,” she chuckled. “I’ll probably always be like that. I’ve always taken care of everybody.”
While she enjoys helping out of the kindness of her own heart, once something she had selflessly been working on begins to feel like a job, she moves onto something else. Kindness is the one thing that shouldn’t feel like a chore.
As a previous stay-at-home-mom, Rose now takes care of her seven grandchildren while her children are at work. Her days are filled with laughter, crying and quality family time. It is often her family who inspires and motivates her to not just talk the talk, but walk the walk of being good to others.
The experiences of being a teen wife and mother helped shape Rose into the person she is today and what made her want to grow up to be a good person and upstanding citizen, not just “another teen mom.” That mindset carried over to her family, where she is constantly motivated to set a good example for them and teaching them to be good. The Rose family is very full, making her proud of each and every person and the way they grew up.
Rose went on to explain, “Women have always been shamed for being a teen mom. I didn’t do anything bad. I raised my children, not my mom, and my husband was right there with me. He’s my best friend. We’ve been through everything together and have always been a team through the fun, sad and bad times.”