FAMILY FUN DAY EVENTS
Asheville in the Roaring Twenties
Antique car show & rides 10 AM - 3 PM
A-B Tech Parking Garage 4th floor (16 Fernihurst Dr)
Asheville Radio Museum 8 AM - 3 PM
306 Elm Building - follow sidewalk signs from garage lobby
Asheville Museum of History 10 AM - 5 PM Across street from parking garage
Radio Vintage Mart 7 AM - 1 PM
Parking Garage 4th floor
FURTHER DETAILS BELOW
Autos and Radio Help Fuel a Building Boom in 1920s Asheville
Throughout the 1920s, new structures and real estate development dramatically changed the skyline and automobiles expanded access to its downtown. In the space of twenty years the town’s population soared from less than 20,000 to over 50,000. New 1920s downtown buildings included the Buncombe County Courthouse (1927 – 1928), the dramatic Art Deco masterpiece Asheville City Building (1926 – 1928), the Jackson Building (1923 – 1924) on Pack Square, the Grove Arcade (1926 – 1929) and a new Battery Park Hotel (1924). And, Asheville's first successful radio station, WWNC, started in 1927, brought the world to Asheville and Asheville to the world.
Mountaineer Motor Tours
curated vintage car show
Join Mountaineer Motor Tours for a display of pre-war cars on Saturday, September 26, from 10 AM - 2 PM. See the vehicles that would have been roaming Asheville's streets during the early years of the automobile, as well as the Golden Age of Asheveill's history - the 1920s. MMT will also provide short rides around the A-B Tech Campus in their Model T, weather depending.
Mountaineer Motor Tours is a company dedicated to sharing the history of Asheville through historic tours in their 1923 Ford Model T touring car, multimedia presentations, abd guided tours for chartered bus groups.
Asheville Radio Museum
The Asheville Radio Museum, with free admission and celebrating its 25th anniversary, is delighted to participate in the Asheville Roaring Twenties Family Fun Day! With activities for adults and children alike, we will also be hosting our sixth annual Vintage Mart from 7 AM – 3 PM in which visitors can view, buy and sell beautiful radios from the 1920s and thereafter. The museum will be open from 8 AM – 3 PM, during which our guides will explain the big impact of radio in the 1920s on farmers and city folks, demonstrating radios of that era as well as early Edison phonographs and the tiny black and white TV sets that followed some decades later. Visit the Listening Room to hear the sweet sound of 20’s music from a vintage vacuum tube amplifier. Kids can spell their names in Morse Code (used in early radio), turn a crank to generate electricity, see lightning in a bottle create static on 1920s radios (leading to the development of static free FM)… even watch a Tesla coil generate energy to light a large fluorescent bulb without even touching it! Souvenirs will include a postcard featuring the famous RCA Nipper dog listening to his master’s voice on a phonograph as well as (while supplies last) actual 1920s radio magazines and radio word game puzzle books. For those interested having an early vacuum tube table radio, several will be available for purchase. Museum T-shirts will be given away in hourly drawings and are also for sale at half price (now $10).
Asheville Museum of History
The Asheville Museum of History (AMoH) is excited to partner with the Asheville Radio Museum and Mountaineer Motor Tours on Saturday, September 26th for Asheville Roaring Twenties Family Fun Day. Throughout the day, we will be hosting family activities and programming dedicated to the 1920s. Our staff and docents will be on hand to help guide you through our new exhibit, Building in the Land of the Sky, where you will learn about a few early 20th-century architects who designed and built some of our city’s most iconic buildings. While you are here, feel free to have a family picnic on our grounds! Our gardens and landscape were inspired by the original plans of the Olmsted Brothers, sons of America’s great landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmsted. The museum will be open from 11 AM - 5 PM with free admission for Asheville Roaring Twenties Family Fun Day!
Asheville Radio Museum Vintage Mart
The museum and vendors from North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia will offer many kinds of restored and restorable vintage radios, parts, accessories and books. In addition, attendees can visit and tour the fascinating Asheville Radio Museum until 3 PM.
Last year’s Vintage Radio Market was a resounding success, with almost three dozen vendors” said Ron Beaver, Asheville Radio Museum president. “Radio collectors, ham radio operators, and families enjoyed seeing the diverse examples of radios from the early 1920s through the 40s and some of the amazing artistry of their wooden cabinets. This year’s event will continue the fun and learning about classic 20th-century radios.”