WV Molasses Festival

Calhoun County has been cooking sorghum in the same valley hollow since 1967, and the 59th Annual West Virginia Molasses Festival returns September 24 through 26, 2026 to West Fork Park at 1280 South Calhoun Highway in Arnoldsburg, free to attend and unchanged in the ways that matter. The production is live and unhurried.

Local growers plant sorghum varieties like Honeydew, Orange, and Tracy in late May, harvest in September after blading the stalks by hand, then feed them through a mill press at the festival grounds. The extracted green juice flows into a long, flat evaporating pan divided into sections, heated over soft wood fire while volunteers push the liquid forward with long paddles and skim off a greenish foam called skimmings. Rick Hall, known in the valley simply as The Molasses Man, watches the syrup drip from a paddle blade. When it forms long, thick strings, the batch is done. One good acre of sorghum yields 60 to 100 gallons. The Country Store sells it fresh, and it sells out.

The festival nearly lost the thread entirely. Back-to-back poor harvests left two consecutive years without any molasses until 2015, when local farmer Gary May and Calhoun County High School FFA students brought the process back. Today the 4-H livestock sale, Saturday grand parade with horse-drawn carriages, 350-half chicken barbecue lunch, and evening square dancing all hold their original form. WVRC radio broadcasts live from noon to 4 PM across all three days.

Camping runs $8 per night on the festival grounds, $10 with electrical hookup. The Little Kanawha River winds through Calhoun County just north of Arnoldsburg, quiet enough for a canoe on a September morning before the molasses pan fires up. Search Lake.com for cabin rentals along the broader river corridor before the weekend fills.