While there will be 4 wheelers tearing it up in the Uwharries this weekend, about 40 miles to the east there will be another annual event - the Carthage Buggy Festival.

The Buggy Festival is reportedly one of the largest events in the Central Park region with 15,000 visitors attending the two day event. Among the highlights are a barbeque cook-off at Nancy Kiser Park (located at the corner of Rockingham Street and South McNeill Street) at 6pm on Friday, May 9th and vendors surrounding the Historic Courthouse from 9am-4pm on Saturday, May 10th. The Courthouse is also the site of the Buggy Festival Idol contest and street dance on Saturday night from 5pm to 11pm.

The festival is named for the town's Buggy Factory which brought wealth and recognition to the town of Carthage in the late 1800s. Originally the Tyson-Kelly Buggy Factory, the facility soon transferred hands as Jones bought out Tyson following the Civil War. According to the Southern Pines Pilot the new owner acquired his wealth in an unusual fashion:


"It was said Jones came by the fortune that enabled his purchase of the Kelly interest by making moonshine liquor while a Confederate prisoner of war. Jones apparently figured out a way to turn scraps of bread and other prison food into whiskey. He sold the drink to his Union guards for hard cash and returned to Carthage after the war with ready money."


This is only one bit of what is a terribly interesting history of this small town of 2,000. If Wikipedia's history of Carthage is to be believed, Henry Ford sought unsuccessfully to use the buggy factory as a manufacturing facility for his automobiles. Think Carthage is cursed? The same history notes that the institution now known as University of North Carolina tried unsuccessfully to be located in Carthage. The town also was once home to the first president to have been impeached, Andrew Johnson.

If you're game to experience the festivities in Carthage this weekend and need a place to stay there are a number of bed and breakfasts located in historic homes throughout town. The stunning Old Buggy Inn was built in 1880, the Blacksmith Inn is right down the road and was built in 1870, and Lauren's Haven (contact by phone at 910-947-2633) is nice as well.