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Marketville offers fun for everyone
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Marketville & Car Show will be celebrating 50 years of the Mustang. Fun begins this Saturday from 7 am and continues until 3 pm. Over 100 vendors are set to attend offering goods ranging from food to yard sale items.

The unmistakable growl of an American Classic will be heard around Warren County Fairgrounds Saturday when the 50th anniversary Mustang makes its Volunteer State debut as part of the annual Marketville event sponsored by the Southern Standard.
Marketville, which is free to the public, will begin at 7  a.m. and continue until 3 p.m. at the home of the Warren County A&L Fair. Over 100 vendors are set to attend, offering arts and crafts along with yard sale items. There will also be food vendors offering a wide variety of items. There will be entertainment acts throughout the day, performing in the grandstands area of the fairgrounds. The show will go on, rain or shine. Last year, around 3,000 people attended Marketville making it one of the heaviest attended annual events in Warren County.
While there will be no rides on the carnival grounds like there are during the second full week of September, there will certainly be a show. The Marketville Car, Truck and Bike show will feature classes from pre-1950s models all the way up to brand new vehicles. The entries will be judged and awards given to the top three finishers in each division. Registration to enter the contest begins at 8 a.m. and costs $20 per entry.
The special treat this year will be the unveiling of the 50th anniversary Mustang thanks to Kidd Ford. A special tabloid contained in today’s edition is also courtesy of Kidd Ford.
In tribute to a half-century of the American Classic, a Mustang car show will also be held, awarding prizes for the best Mustang from 1964-1989 and 1990-2004.
“There will be something for everyone,” said Southern Standard Publisher Pat Zechman. “We invite the community to come out and enjoy themselves.”

Local farm partnership brings fresh beef to Warren County Schools
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Warren County Schools has beefed up lunch menus this school year through a new community partnership. Thanks to a collaboration between the district’s School Nutrition Department and Barton Creek Farms, students at Warren County High School, Warren County Middle School, West Elementary, Eastside Elementary, and Dibrell Elementary are enjoying locally sourced, farm-fresh beef in their lunches as part of a pilot program.

The initiative, spearheaded by Terri Mullican, Director of School Nutrition, has already shown great promise in its first few months. The partnership with Barton Creek Farms, located in Rock Island, Tennessee, ensures that the beef served is not only local to Warren County but of the highest quality. Barton Creek Farms specializes in farm-to-fork beef, with grass-fed and grain-finished cattle. Each calf is born and raised in Rock Island and goes through USDA-inspected processing, ensuring it meets the strictest safety and quality standards.

“When the opportunity arose to provide fresh, local beef, we knew it was a no-brainer,” Mullican said. “The fact that it’s a product from right here in our community makes it even more special. We can’t wait to implement it district-wide.”

Barton Creek Farms delivers fresh ground beef to the district monthly, and the nutrition

department incorporates it into homemade recipes such as lasagna, meatloaf, chili, and tacos.

As of now, the beef is being served at five schools, but the ultimate goal is to expand the program to all ten lunch-serving schools in the district.

The pilot program originated from a conversation between Mary Roller of Barton Creek Farms and Mullican. Roller, recognizing the farm’s potential to support local schools, reached out to gauge the district’s interest in serving local beef to students. Around the same time, a Warren County school board member contacted Mullican to share information about a similar partnership in neighboring Dekalb County, which helped push the initiative forward.

The timing worked in the district’s favor, as the nutrition department was able to fund the purchase of the beef using existing resources, eliminating the need for additional funding. Now that the pilot program is enjoying a successful run, the department has budgeted to extend the partnership district-wide for the 2025-26 school year.

Dr. Grant Swallows, Director of Schools, praised the program’s economic approach to student nutrition.

“This pilot is a perfect example of how we can use local resources to continue providing nutritious, healthy meals for our students,” he said. “We are grateful for partnerships like this one that benefit both our students and our local community. We always strive to support our local businesses when we can because our community is so good to us.”

In addition to working with Warren County Schools, Barton Creek Farms also partners with local restaurants to offer farm-fresh beef on their menus. The farm’s offerings include ground beef, steaks, roasts, and custom cuts by the quarter, half, or whole cow, meeting diverse consumer needs.

As the program continues to grow, the district hopes to expand its focus on farm-to-school meals, benefiting students’ health and connecting them to the agricultural roots of the community