Cheese Days Festival Set to Take Over Toledo

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The annual town celebration known as Cheese Days is headed back to Toledo this weekend for a four-day hoedown in honor of the city’s close-knit agricultural roots. The festivities will begin today. 

According to Diana Haug, site leader at the Toledo Senior Center, the highlights will include a classic country and western music performance by Nehemiah Brown and the Esther Borte Memorial Quilt Show. Haug noted that Brown will perform at 6 p.m. on Saturday night at Toledo High School. 

“He will be singing country hits like Jim Reeves, Eddie Arnold, Randy Travis as well as some gospel,” Haug said. Doors to that show will open at 5 p.m. 

Earlier that day, the Esther Borte Memorial Quilt show will take place at the Toledo Middle School.

“Esther was a major force in our center and has made many quilts as well as teaching many years of quilting to the seniors of Toledo,” wrote Haug in an email.

Wily Young is a Toledo native who has hung around his fair share of Cheese Days festivities, which this year will occur amid the town’s 125th anniversary. In fact, the first memory to the front of his mind starred another one of the Borte clan. Young said that one year, around 1980 he believes, John Borte elicited quite a response from the crowd as he positioned his log truck for the parade. According to Young, Borte was pulling a giant single-log load with his log truck and as he made the approach up the hill by the middle school he punched the gas and brought both of his front truck wheels high up off the ground for a crowd pleasing big rig wheelie.

“It was right before the parade started and he was coming up that hill,” said Young, who noted that Borte was apparently pleased enough with the result that he dropped the hammer down once more for another wheelie before assuming his position in line for the parade. “That was something you don’t see every day.”

Young says that Cheese Days used to feature a popular Old Timers baseball game as well, but that tradition has somehow faded away.

“It was great,” said Young. “You had these guys in their 70s out there turning double plays and looking good doing it.”

This year, the schedule will look a bit different than it did in 1980, but there are plenty of entertaining and enticing options anyhow.

Cheese Days will begin on Thursday at 1 p.m. with the Toledo Made exhibit at Gallery 505. That exhibit, which will feature arts and crafts from local residents, will run through 7 p.m. From 3-7 p.m. that same day, the Toledo Thursday Market will be open near the Toledo boat launch. That scene will include live music, handmade and homegrown products, children’s activities and cornhole competitions. Finally, the first day will be rounded out by the official 2017 Toast of the Big Cheeses. That happening will take place at the Morgan Arts Centre at 190 Plomondon Road. The event is open to the public and tickets cost $10 per person.

On Friday, the 20th annual “Cheddar Open” golf tournament will tee off at 10 a.m. at the Newaukum Valley Golf Course in Chehalis. Additionally, the Second Time Around garage sale will be open from 10 a.m. until 6 p.m. in the Head Start building behind the Toledo Senior Center. The Toledo Made Exhibit will continue from 1-5 p.m. on Friday at Gallery 505 and the tennis tournament will begin service at 3 p.m. The tennis tournament will include brackets for men’s singles, women’s singles, men’s doubles, women’s doubles and mixed teams.



Friday evening will begin with a hot dog dinner from 5 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. at Toledo High School. That event is being sponsored by the Toledo High School class of 2019. After scarfing some dinner Cheese Days revelers would be wise to head to the high school track for the frog jumping contest from 6-8:30 p.m. Entry fees are $1 per frog and there is no limit on the number of entries. Finally, Friday night will wrap up with a few rounds of bingo at the high school from 6:30-9 p.m.

The good time will start early on Saturday as the Toledo Lions Club will host a coffee house 5-11 a.m. including hot coffee, hot chocolate, muffins and donuts. After grabbing a first cup, Cheese Day attendees can head over to the Senior Center for an all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast beginning at 7 a.m. The smorgasbord is slated to last until 10:30 a.m. or “as long as the food lasts.” Offerings will include ham, pancakes, eggs, biscuits and gravy, juice and other beverages. A donation is suggested for the meal. 

At 7 a.m. on Saturday, the 17th annual car and motorcycle show will open up at the middle school football field and at 8 a.m. the Cheddar Challenge race will take off from the Toledo Fire Station. From 9 a.m. until 4 p.m., the Kids’ Fun Fest will be hosted by the high school class of 2019 inside the Middle School gym.

Also on Saturday, the Toledo Library book and bake sale will take place from 9 a.m. until 2 p.m. and the Esther Borte Quilt and Art Show will run from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. A second chance for the Second Time Around garage sale will also be offered on Saturday from 10 a.m. until 6 p.m.

All of those morning offerings are simply a way to pass the time until the Toledo Cheese Days Parade begins at 11 a.m. This year’s parade theme is “125 Years of Connections.” Free cheese sandwiches will be offered at the Presbyterian Church at noon following the parade. From noon until 2 p.m. there will be a cheesecake competition in the Middle School commons and from noon until 4 p.m. the high school soccer team will run an inflatable and dunk tank at the middle school. At 1 p.m. a town auction will be held at the middle school football field and at 2:15 p.m. the Gateway Pizza Eating Contest will begin at the middle school football field. For those old enough to indulge, the remnants of all that savory food can be washed away at the Toledo Boat Launch where a wine and cheese tasting is scheduled for 4-8 p.m.

At 4 p.m. on Saturday, Toledo High School soccer veterans can participate in the women’s alumni soccer game, and the men’s alumni game will take over the pitch at 6 p.m. A midnight dance will begin at 9 p.m. in the Market Fresh parking lot. The shindig will be deejayed by none other than former Toledo basketball standout Austin Trafelet.

For anyone who overindulged during Saturday’s Cheese Days festivities, Sunday offers a chance to get right with 8 a.m. church services listed on the official guide of activities. 

A horseshoe tournament begins at 8 a.m. as well. The tennis tournament will run all day on Sunday, and the third rendition of the Second Time Around garage sale will take place from 10 a.m. until 12:30 p.m. From 11 a.m. until 4 p.m., an all-class reunion will be held at Kemp Olson Toledo Community Park. That park will also host a cheese cake by the slice operation and a beef barbecue put on by the Lions Club. The cheesecake will be for sale from noon until 2:30 p.m. and the barbecue will be offered from 12:30 p.m. until 3 p.m. The 13th annual pie auction will begin shortly after the conclusion of the barbecue. Wrapping things up at the park will be the Lion’s Club surplus beef auction at 2:30 p.m.

Rounding things out, the Toledo Made exhibit will be open at Gallery 505 again from 1 p.m. until 5 p.m.

Additional information on Toledo Cheese Days is available online at www.toledolionsclub.org/cheesedays.html.