URBANNA, Va. -- The 65th annual Urbanna Oyster Festival takes place Saturday from 9 a.m. through 5 p.m. in the picturesque town along the Rappahannock River.
Joe Heyman and Eric Faudree have volunteered in the festival for more than three decades.
“It was started back then, in 57 and 58 to recognize the local people that made their living on the water," Eric Faudree explained. "It's developed into one of the longest, most successful small-town festivals in the country.”
Heyman said the event is the oldest oyster festival in the country and the second oldest in the world.
The event attracts over 50,000 people, so hundreds of volunteers are needed in the town of roughly 450 residents.
"It's an all-out effort. We got great partners in the sheriff's department, VDOT and in the state police," Heyman said. "Emergency personnel and the fire department are all in. They're running shuttles and everything."
Deborah Pratt is a longtime volunteer and the undisputed oyster-shucking champion.
“I started shucking in 1975 in a small oyster house," Pratt said.
That same oyster house is where Pratt’s family and others worked in the 1950s.
"So my sister showed me how to open oysters one afternoon on my mother's doorstep," she recalled. "And I took it from there."
The job helped support her family as did her 35-year nursing career. But shucking was in her blood.
"So I chose, I'd' rather shuck oysters than do anything in this world because that's how much I love it," she said.
Pratt has been at it for a long time.
“To be honest with you, if they're 6 and 5, I'm 35," Pratt said.
Pratt has broken many records, competed nationally and is proud of her four-time world international wins. But being a champion is about more than just shucking an oyster, she said.
"The presentation means more than anything in the world," Pratt explained. "It's how you cut it, how you place it so don't slide off. They look for dirt, grit, mud, blood — and it must stay on the shell."
She has mastered it all and has stayed humble.
"I think my life dream is just living here and being in this little town. It's a small town, but it's a lot of love here," Pratt said.
She said how you carry yourself and look for respect is important.
"That's what we need to get back to is how we carry ourselves and find our respect," she said. "And then life will be much better than we going through now."
Life is good for Pratt. She shucks, but does she eat oysters?
"I don't play that," she laughed. "No, darling, I don't eat them at all."
But thousands of people do, and visitors have made the festival and the Town of Urbanna what it is today.
"The people are just very friendly," Heyman said "And in two or three blocks, you covered the entire Main Street area."
That is because the town is half a square mile or half a mile each direction, Heyman explained.
"Honey, they come for those little oysters. When they come here for the festival, what are they looking for? They come here to feast off of oysters," Pratt said.
The molluscs are harvested by the local oyster houses. Some are the same facilities where Pratt's family and others made a living and supported families.
"I didn't go to college, but I got it, I got a degree that nobody would never take away from me," Pratt said. "And that's open an oyster and then I can teach you how to open that oyster."
Make sure to catch Pratt Saturday at the oyster shucking contest and enjoy other activities at the festival.
While there is no admission fee for the festival, you will have to pay for parking. Food and drinks are pay as you go.
If you would like to try your hands at oyster shucking, sign up before 10 a.m.
"It's time for some new folks to come in to move Deborah Pratt out of the way," Pratt laughed.
Heyman said Pratt is "definitely the queen of oyster shuckers."
Click here for more information about the Urbanna Oyster Festival.
