Why Would Anyone Promote Lying?
FLOYD, Va. — Ever since the 3rd Annual Tellabration! Liars Contest was announced, organizer Clinton Atwater has heard one question more than any other: Why would anyone promote lying? The contest is Saturday, November 21, at 5:30 p.m. at The June Bug Center in Floyd, and admission is free.
“It’s a fair question, and I love answering it,” said Atwater, founder of Storytelling Connections, LLC and producer of the Let Me Tell Ya! storytelling series. “A liars contest has nothing to do with deceiving anybody. Everyone in the room knows the story isn’t true, the same way everyone at a magic show knows nobody really got sawed in half. Nobody is fooled, and everybody is delighted. It’s a contest to see who can tell the best tall tale.”
AN AMERICAN ART FORM
Tall tales grew out of the bragging contests of the American frontier, and humorous frontier yarns flourished in print from the 1820s until the Civil War. Mark Twain argued that this kind of storytelling was a distinctly American art. In his 1897 essay “How to Tell a Story,” he wrote: “The humorous story is American, the comic story is English, the witty story is French.”
The tradition took root in communities across the country. In 1929, the Burlington Liars’ Club in Wisconsin began naming an annual “World Champion Liar,” a title it still awards. In the 1930s, folklorist Zora Neale Hurston collected the “lying sessions” held on the porch of Joe Clarke’s store in Eatonville, Florida, the first incorporated Black town in America, for her landmark book Mules and Men.
Closer to home, the West Virginia State Liars Contest has been a highlight of the state’s Vandalia Gathering folk festival for decades, drawing standing-room-only crowds. Its top prize is the Golden Shovel, a tradition the Floyd contest echoes with Golden Shovel Awards for all three winners. West Virginia’s contest also launched one of the country’s best-known storytellers, Bil Lepp, a five-time champion who now performs nationally, including at the National Storytelling Festival in Jonesborough, Tennessee. Lepp has described the technique simply: a good tall tale starts out at least a little believable, then the exaggeration grows so gradually that listeners go right along with it.
THE CRAFT BEHIND THE WHOPPER
That gradual climb is exactly what the Floyd contest rewards. Each teller has six minutes, with no notes, to take the audience from an ordinary beginning to an outrageous finish. Three Floyd County judges score technique, story development, originality, and how well the story works as a tall tale. The audience’s laughter counts too.
“The best tall tales keep you asking, ‘Wait, could any of that be true?’ right up to the last line,” Atwater said. “It isn’t a string of one-liners. It’s a real story, with a beginning, a middle and an end, and the comedy comes from how it builds. That takes real skill.”
PART OF A WORLDWIDE CELEBRATION
Atwater intentionally ties the contest to Tellabration!, the worldwide celebration of storytelling created in 1988 by Connecticut storyteller J.G. “Paw Paw” Pinkerton and expanded nationally in 1990 by the National Storytelling Network. Its main goal is to introduce new listeners to storytelling.
“Tellabration! is about showing people that storytelling is a performance art,” Atwater said. “A liars contest does that better than almost anything. People come for the laughs, and they leave with a new appreciation for what a great storyteller can do.”
Contestant registration closes Sunday, November 15. The contest is a Let Me Tell Ya! Storytelling Event presented with Blue Ridge Story Space and sponsored by The June Bug Center, Sounds of the Mountains Storytelling Festival, the Virginia Storytelling Alliance (VASA) and Brogan Insurance.
WHAT
3rd Annual Tellabration! Liars Contest
WHEN
Saturday, November 21, 2026, 5:30–7:00 p.m.
WHERE
The June Bug Center for Arts & Education, 251 Parkway Ln S, Floyd, VA 24091
ADMISSION
Free
CONTESTANT ENTRY
$10, all proceeds to The June Bug Center. Limited to 8 tellers. Registration closes Sunday, Nov. 15.
REGISTER TO COMPETE
eventbrite.com/e/1998068115520
PRIZES
$100 (1st), $50 (2nd), $25 (3rd), plus a Golden Shovel Award for each winner
Media: Clinton Atwater is available for interviews and can tell a short tall tale on air. Hear a sample: tinyurl.com/3pjrfjfp
ABOUT STORYTELLING CONNECTIONS AND LET ME TELL YA!
Storytelling Connections, LLC was founded by storyteller Clinton Atwater around one vision: connecting stories and people. It produces Let Me Tell Ya!, a storytelling community that hosts live events across the region and meets online twice a month for workshops and story swaps. Atwater received the National Storytelling Network’s 2025 ORACLE Award for service and leadership to the Mid-Atlantic storytelling community.
