By Daniel Hartill,Staff Writer
After a 13-year run, the annual Festival de Joie, celebrating Franco culture, calls it quits.

LEWISTON – The joie is over.

The Festival de Joie, the annual three-day celebration of Franco-American culture that draws thousands of people to Lewiston, has been dissolved, organizers said Thursday.

“We had no choice,” said Lionel Guay, the longtime festival chairman. “We could not get volunteers to help us. And the volunteers we have are too old.”

The move is likely to leave a void in the community’s summertime calendar. For the past 13 years, the event drew people together with live music and Franco-American food.

Festival institutions such as the C’est Si Bon Cafe, which served a menu highlighted by crepes and meat pies, drew hundreds of people for every meal. Musical performances would then lift the same hundreds to their feet to dance.

Typically, the festival drew 10,000 to 12,000 people over its three days.

The needed workforce of volunteers, some 200 strong, were getting tired, though. The average age of volunteers was well over 50. Many were in their 70s and becoming frail. Some died.

“I hate to see it go like this,” said Marcel Chaloux, 77. “But the young people were not getting involved.”

Chaloux, a member of the festival’s board, is part of a committee that’s hoping to create a smaller event aimed at celebrating Franco culture.

The committee includes people from La Survivance Francaise, Les Richelieu and the Franco-American Heritage Center at St. Mary’s.

“We don’t want to let this big void happen,” said Rita Dube, the heritage center’s executive director. “I think the intention of the group is to start small and hope it works.”

To that end, Chaloux’s daughter, Loraine Fontaine, bought the festival’s kitchen equipment and hopes to transfer it to the new event.

However, before any group moves forward, they will have to come up with a leader.

Shortly after last year’s festival ended, Guay, Lewiston’s 64-year-old mayor, announced he was stepping down as chairman.

Finding a replacement was tough, said Chaloux, particularly since leaders all knew how hard Guay worked.

“He did too much, really,” Chaloux said. Not only did he administer the festival, he also picked the performers.

Eventually, the festival board gave up.

“There were just too many people on the board who didn’t want to continue,” Chaloux said.

It’s disappointing but common to many volunteer groups, said James Bennett, Lewiston’s city administrator.

“I think it’s reflective of the times,” he said. “People aren’t volunteering the way they used to in past decades.”

For the people who helped create the festival and keep it running, the rewards were great, Chaloux said.

Sitting in his kitchen Thursday, the retired paper worker recalled helping set up a stage when the festival was held at the Central Maine Civic Center.

The C’est Si Bon Band would bring everyone to their feet with Franco music

“We’d fill the place,” Chaloux said, smiling as he spoke. “That was my incentive for working all week and putting things together. I’d see 3,000 people enjoy it.”

It ought to survive, Dube said.

“We can’t let the heritage and tradition die out,” she said.

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