52 Ancestors-Week 45: Bearded – Growing a Beard for a Contest

November 05, 2020

This is my third year working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow. I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails into the Past. I have enjoyed writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways.

My grandfather, Tom J. Johnston once grew a beard for a contest.

I had written previously about my grandfather’s beard. This post is an update because I found a record held at the Contra Costa County Historical Society that substantiates the contest.

In Walnut Creek, where my maternal grandparents, Tom J. and Pansy Johnston, and their daughter, Lela Nell, lived is a yearly festival in September called the Walnut Festival. Before large housing tracts were built, the area had numerous walnut orchards and a big packing plant in downtown Walnut Creek to process the walnuts.

When I was growing up in the 1960s in Walnut Creek, many of the homes had some of these old walnut trees in their yards. Kids would come to school with black hands from pulling the hulls off the walnuts, caused by the walnut husk fly whose larva turned the husks black. It didn’t hurt the walnuts, but certainly made a mess on the harvester’s hands. Our yard had no walnut trees, so were spared from helping our parents pick the nuts.

The festivals in Walnut Creek were first held in 1911 as a celebration of the grape harvest but during prohibition walnuts replaced grapes as the area crop. The first Walnut Festival started in 1936. There were lots of activities at these festivals and in 1949 a “Whiskerino” contest was judged on the first day, as can be seen from the program found at the archives.[1]

1949 Walnut Festival Program

My grandfather grew a beard and entered the contest. He did not win, but it must have been lots of fun.[2] However, I never found another photo of him in a beard.