SHILOH ― People started lining up at 9:30 a.m. Friday, an hour before the opening of the annual Shiloh Fireman’s Ox Roast, eager to buy their tasty roast beef sandwiches.
“People waited patiently,” said Firefighter Derrick Wallace of the Shiloh-Cass-Bloominggrove Volunteer Fire Department, who was busy with food preparation at the Ohio 603 fire station.
“We opened at 10:30,” said Wallace, 39, who is also a member of the Shelby Fire Department.
The 57th annual Fireman’s Ox Roast and Shiloh-Cass-Bloominggrove Firefighters Association purchased 10,000-plus pounds of beef for sandwiches and bulk sales Friday and Saturday in the village.
Wallace said more than 300 pies were donated and 37,000 buns ordered.
“It’s a record number of everything,” said Wallace, a third-generation Shiloh firefighter.
And yes, although he helps every year, he still loves the hot roast beef sandwiches.
Community volunteers make festival a success, firefighters say
The annual Shiloh Firemen’s Ox Roast wouldn’t be possible if not for about 30-plus firefighters, retired firefighters and volunteers who work as a team to make the festival a success, said Cass-Bloomingrove and Shiloh Fire Chief Jeff Burrer.
“It’s a lot of work but it helps the department with everything from the cost of firefighters getting training to buying equipment for the department,” he said. “Guys take vacation and others make sacrifices to help all weekend.”
Wallace said many volunteer groups came to help make the food sales a success and the fire department provides the nonprofits with a donation for their services, including lots of Mennonite groups, FFAs, Plymouth-Shiloh Teachers Association and Franklin Township Fire Department to name a few.
“The community just comes together,” he said. “I had the first sandwich that was served down here.”
Marin Fairchild was volunteering in the fire station for her first time with Rubies, a safe haven in Mansfield for women who have been victims of human trafficking and/or addiction.
Fairchild was slicing pies and placing them in individual plastic triangular containers.
Volunteers Andrew Sensenig, 13, and his cousin Cameron Newswanger, 13, were scooping the hot, shredded beef onto buns and wrapping them up in foil.
Their favorite part of the festival?
“The food,” Andrew said.
The festival also includes live music, concession stands, rides for kids, a fireworks show and a parade, the latter on Saturday at 7 p.m.
Dan and Rene Burtscher of Shelby were shopping at nearby Planktown with Rene’s mother Martha Roberts now of Florida and formerly of Shelby, and decided to stop for a sandwich.
They didn’t mind the unusually long lines and it was Roberts’ first time to try a roast beef sandwich at the festival.
“I’ve never had one,” she said, adding she was looking forward to eating one.
Mike Whited, 63, of Bucyrus, and Vernie Beach, 78, of Caledonia, rode their Harleys to the festival on the humid Friday morning.
The two friends said they are regulars at the ox roast.
Beach said he would probably just buy one sandwich.
“Gotta save room for pie,” he said. As the sky darkened, they both said they hoped they wouldn’t get wet riding home.
Waiting along the sidewalk near the train tracks on Ohio 603, both men said it was probably the longest line they’d ever seen.
Preparation starts way before festival
Every year firefighters place roughly 10,000 pounds of beef into a pit, or “oven,” along Ohio 603 starting around 6:30 p.m. Thursday.
After about 12 hours of being cooked on coals in the pit, the beef is ready for sandwiches and for bulk sales in the village.
“Our goal is to have enough beef. We usually run out by 4 or 5 p.m. Saturday,” Burrer said.
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