Kids can show off their costumes and collect some candy during the annual Fall Festival this Saturday.

The festival, hosted by Uptown Wadesboro, Inc., will include trick-or-treating at participating uptown businesses, games with prizes, storytelling, fortune-telling, a kids’ costume contest with prizes, pumpkin painting, and even a pet costume contest. Free children’s books will be available through the Anson County Partnership for Children.

The festival will be held from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Boy Scouts will lead the crowd in the Pledge of Allegiance during the opening cermony at 10 a.m., according to Julian Swittenberg, a member of Uptown Wadesboro, Inc.

Three story tellers — Officers Scott Gulledge and Jay Yarborough with the Wadesboro Police Department, and Donna Liles from the town hall — will entertain children from 10:30 to 11 a.m., according to Bebe Gaddy, another Uptown member.

The pet costume contest will be judged at 11 a.m., and the kids’ costume contest will be judged at noon.

Justin Jones, a middle school teacher with Anson Middle School, will show kids science experiments with pumpkins from 11:30 to noon.

Balloons will be displayed by businesses participating in trick-or-treating that day, Gaddy said. Those interested in volunteering or donating candy can call the town at 704-694-5171 or drop donations off at the town hall.

To learn more about the festival or Uptown Wadesboro, call 704-695-1644 or email uptownwadesboro@windstream.net.

Reach reporter Imari Scarbrough at 704-994-5471 and follow her on Twitter @ImariScarbrough.

By Imari Scarbrough

iscarbrough@civitasmedia.com