By Kevin Horne & Chris Buchignani

“They’ll be enjoying the tailgating afterwards, with a 30-point win.”

On that note, ABC’s Brad Nessler wrapped up the national broadcast of Penn State’s October 1, 2005 win over 18th-ranked Minnesota, a 44-14 shellacking that featured two standout plays that would endure for years among the program’s most memorable – quarterback Michael Robinson’s violent collision with a Gopher safety and linebacker Paul Posluszny’s leaping, over-the-pile takedown at the goal line. Nessler was right, of course, the parking lots would be especially raucous that evening, but the celebration in Happy Valley was only just beginning.

As the Beaver Stadium shadows began to lengthen and the crowd bid the vanquished Golden Gophers farewell with strains of “Na Na, Hey Hey,” energy was already building for a weeklong party, fueled by an anxious anticipation that would electrify all of Nittany Nation. After years of losing at an unprecedented rate, the NIttany Lions were 5-0 and, dating back to the previous season, on a seven-game winning streak, the program’s longest in more than five years. The sixth-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes were coming to town the following Saturday, a perfect opportunity to show the nation that Penn State football was back. And the nation took notice.

ESPN announced that its college football programming for the week would center on Happy Valley. College GameDay, the network’s wildly popular live pregame show, would make its first visit to campus since 1999, and Cold Pizza, a more youth-oriented morning show that airing on ESPN2, would broadcast live from outside Beaver Stadium on the Friday before the game.

“We try to go to the most intriguing match-up of the week. Penn State is a big story line in college football right now,” Associate Manager for ESPN Communications Mac Nwulu told The Daily Collegian.

The increased media attention on Penn State dovetailed with the Lions’ debut at No. 16 in the polls, the team’s first in-season ranking since the ’99 campaign. But even before “the Worldwide Leader” began cranking up its hype machine, the Penn State student body would stage a compelling display of spontaneous enthusiasm.

“That Ohio State week, I was driving home – I lived in Toftrees at the time – probably 11 o’clock on Sunday night, after the Minnesota game, and I was pulling around the turn, and I saw, probably seven (or) eight tents,” former quarterbacks coach Jay Paterno recalls.

“I stopped my car. There was nobody else on the road at that hour. And I go, ‘Oh my God. They’re camping out for next Saturday.’ So before I even moved, I called Guido.”

Penn State football’s branding guru Guido D’Elia knew what needed to happen next. “I immediately called the press to get them up there and document it. I knew we had to turn this into a story to make sure nobody tried to shut it down.”

His plan worked. Beginning the next day, local news coverage (with national outlets close behind) prominently featured the emerging tent city, briefly dubbed “Camp Nittany” before “Paternoville” stuck as its permanent moniker. The campout continued growing throughout the week, with more tents appearing each day. President Graham Spanier, Joe Paterno, and dozens of players made surprise visits, to cheer on the campers and soak in the spectacle.

“It was just exciting. I would drive by or walk by Paternoville just to get that energy for the game,” remembers Derrick Williams, the freshman wide receiver and top recruiting prospect whose versatile play had sparked Penn State’s offense.

The mounting excitement did not stop at Paternoville. D’Elia next unleashed another catalyst to spark even greater fervor: The “White Out.” The 10,000-strong Beaver Stadium student section would dress all in white, creating an iconic image and inspiring ESPN analyst Kirk Herbstreit to famously dub it the best in the country. Students, locals, and visiting fans all got into the spirit, and the sudden demand for white Penn State apparel gave a jolt to the Downtown economy. College Avenue storefronts were emblazoned in Blue and White. Spontaneous football discussions interrupted classes. School spirit gripped State College.

College towns like State College are distinct in that they are self-contained communities, but also extend their metaphorical borders to the far corners of the world, encompassing legions of loyal and nostalgic alumni. There is nothing quite like when something briefly unites that physical and cultural community, or to be at “ground zero” of that – heading to work or class, feeling the energy and attention of a “Nittany Nation” all focused in on your place – where it touches into every aspect of your day, where it’s the hot topic of conversation, splashed across every newspaper front page and leading the nightly news, local storefronts declare their support and invite the patronage of enthusiastic customers. This was the phenomenon at work that week in the Nittany Valley, as a community came together to reclaim a shared identity that once seemed lost, perhaps forever.

Joe Paterno’s career longevity was unusual, but his staying power at a single institution was without precedent, offering fans and alumni a chance to experience something unique. The old man’s steady presence on the sidelines through the decades, graduating players, winning football games, and promising to go on for “four or five more years,” offered a “through-line” connecting generations of Penn Staters, a unifying point of common reference. From the undergraduates making their homes on the hard pavement outside Beaver Stadium to the legions of alumni

“That week, it really was like Woodstock,” reflects Jay Paterno. “It was totally organic. It wasn’t forced. It wasn’t regulated. And it really took on a life of its own.”

Reflecting back on it now, the team’s defensive coordinator, Tom Bradley, a long-time Nittany Lion who now coaches at UCLA summed it up: “Definitely magical. The White Out and all the things that went with it. The nation got to see what Penn State football and Penn State students are all about up there that night.”

In the slower summer months in Happy Valley, Arts Fest looms large on the calendar. The Central Pennsylvania Festival of the Arts has been a special time of year for many decades, since its earliest days as a student-initiated celebration on up through the singular tradition it has become today.

It’s no stretch to point out that Arts Fest is closer to a cultural tradition of the Nittany Valley than it is merely the sum of its parts as a nonprofit initiative, or an artistic festival, or an occasion for nostalgic homecomings. And it’s particularly as a cultural tradition that Arts Fest is most worth celebrating. So what are we celebrating?

Togetherness, first and foremost. Arts Fest, more than any other point on the calendar, is a commitment to being together in the Nittany Valley. And it’s in that togetherness that we rediscover each summer the resilient and radiant nature of the spirit of our community.

In an earlier age, our American Indian predecessors remarked upon this area’s strange magnetism with the legend of King Wi-Daagh, whose power to compel visitors to return and pay tribute lingered even beyond the grave. Call it “something in the water,” the Spirit of the Valley, or simply the stubborn curse of a long-dead chieftain, a bewitching quality draws people back.

Penn State football brings townspeople, students, and alumni together throughout the fall. Penn State student philanthropy brings many together each February. And the Blue-White scrimmage each April echoes the games of autumn. Yet Arts Fest stands apart, because those who stay or return do so most often simply to be together during one of the most beautiful months of the year. It’s often an external calling that brings us together in the Nittany Valley, but for those who celebrate Arts Fest, it’s more often than not a personal whispering of the heart that calls them back.

Arts Fest also is a celebration of physical place. Strangely, this is something most of us tend to lack. Of course, we all live someplace in particular. But in the midst of our suburbanized society, we often do lack a sense of place. If we’re not cloistered away in cul-de-sacs and commuting in atomized, climate-controlled transport, we’re more likely than not insulated within the thick walls of some apartment residence.

In coming together in the Nittany Valley, we’re coming to a specific place. One where we live or once studied. One where we played or drink. One whose paths and landmarks and trees and boundaries feel far more concrete and timeless than most of the places we experience in our everyday lives. This beautiful, physical place is the context for togetherness for a few special days, and a time surely for appreciating beautiful people and their creations as much as for admiring the specialness of place that helps keep Happy Valley so happy.

Yet Arts Fest is a celebration of something even more beautiful. Nostalgia, to paraphrase an insightful writer, is powerful because it tells us about what’s not presently in our life by reminding us what once was a part of our life. In other words, nostalgia is an invitation to remember some of the things we love and an urging to find a way to re-encounter that love.

We celebrate Arts Fest because it’s a form of living nostalgia. In the midst of our togetherness in one of America’s happiest places, and in getting away from the sort daily life that so often isolates rather than unites us, we encounter bits of our past that we love. Arts Fest is like an invitation to consciously recognize the things we miss, and bring them back into our daily lives.

On your trip back for Arts Fest this (or any) year, make time to encounter or reacquaint yourself with these things. Visit and learn the story of Old Willow as you cross Old Main lawn. Carve out a few hours for an early morning hike up Mount Nittany. Buy the button. Sleep in a dorm. A slower pace offers the chance to fondly remember all that’s changed and cherish how much yet remains.

In this light, Arts Fest is “itself a work of art” as former Penn State Trustee Ben Novak writes in “The Birth of the Craft Brew Revolution:” 

“In order to enjoy the festival itself as art,” Novak reflects, “one needs but a quiet time of recollection and a good tankard of ale. Then one can summon up again the best of the sights and sounds and smells and tastes and feelings of the festival week. One can savor each one, turning it over carefully in one’s mind, converting what might have been only a momentary thrill into a lasting impression. After all, isn’t that what art is—the converting of something momentary, like a fleeting smile on a woman’s face, into something lasting, like the Mona Lisa?”

This year during Arts Fest, no matter how fleeting or lasting your time, try to consciously recognize the sort of people, places, and experiences that make you happiest, and bring them with you when you leave. You might find a new spirit, itself like a work of art, animating your daily life.