Folks enjoying the music

Home

Each year during Labor Day weekend, visitors pay homage to the legends and stories of the 28-mile Yadkin River Valley known as Historic Happy Valley at the Historic Happy Valley Old-time Fiddlers' Convention. The convention will take place this year, September 4 - 6, on the Jones Farm, northeast of Lenoir on N.C. Byway 268. The Jones Farm is the historic property of Tony Jones and his family, and home to Laura Foster's resting place. Laura Foster lived directly across the road from the current festival on German's Hill. Tom Dooley, a local man who served during the Civil War, was accused of murdering a neighbor, Laura Foster, in 1867. The events surrounding this crime and Dooley's subsequent trial and execution live on in North Carolina's best-known murder ballad and in stories passed down through local families. Historic Happy Valley and the areas along N.C. Highway 268 are worth celebrating because little has changed in generations. Being a fiddler himself, Tom Dooley would have felt at home at the Historic Happy Valley Old-Time Fiddlers' Convention.