April 1, 2008 4:01 PM
There Were No Plain Janes at the Old Mandeville Jane Austen Festival.
 |  Festival committee members Diane Rosiere, Richard Boyd, K.B. Richardson and Julie Egle  Adam Rodgers, Frank Stansbury and Dylan Charlet (Participants in the Looking for Mr. Darcy contest) |
Kerri Blache, along with a group of volunteers who share a fascination with England and Jane Austen novels, put together first annual Old Mandeville Jane Austen Festival, during the weekend of Feb. 16-17, with an overall mission to foster the fine art of letter writing – a recurring motif in the works of Jane Austen.
The festival held two major competitions; one involved judging gentlemen, the Mr. Darcy contest (of Pride and Prejudice fame), and the other was the “perfect love letter writing contest.” The weekend festivities also included staged readings, a “No Plain Janes” costume contest, costumed characters, demonstrations of crafts of the Austen era, carriage rides, music and plenty of cuisine for festival-goers.