Friends of Joseph Merli are working to make his ninth annual fall festival and car show the biggest one yet.

They are also holding a blood drive in his honor at the festival. Merli has been battling leukemia for more than a year.

“You really don’t even think about the importance of blood and holding these drives until an illness or tragedy strikes,” said Merli’s friend Ginny Stewart. “But Joe and millions of others know the importance of relying on blood and platelets.”

Ginny’s husband, Daniel Stewart, is as close to Merli as a brother. They share a passion for antique cars.

Merli owns a shop on Route 20 where his parents once offered food and beds to motorists and vacationers. The Joseph J. Merli Manufacturing Company fabricates and assembles Victorian-style carriages, wagons, and pushcarts.

Each year, Merli he has held his historic fall festival featuring an antique car and hot rod show, as well as blacksmithing and tinsmithing presentations, a farmers’ market, and arts and crafts vendors.

“If Joe was able, he would be doing this, and we just want to honor him,” said Stewart, who is part of a committee of friends of Merli’s organizing the event. “Joe is a fantastic human being and has given so much to the community; we just want to give back to him.”

Stewart, when she got the idea to hold a blood drive in conjunction with the festival, contacted the American Red Cross, which helped her put together a mobile drive for the site.

Mobile blood drives can handle only 40 to 45 donors and Stewart said she is proud to have 34 committed donors already.

Most of them, she said, are people who know Merli personally.

“Once word got out that we were doing this for him, the names of people who wanted to donate started rolling in,” said Stewart.

The festival will be held on Sept. 26 and 27 next to Merli’s shop at the Canal Street Station, three miles east of Duanesburg. The blood drive will be held on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m.

“We’re really hoping the festival will be a way to bring people together for him,” said Stewart. “He won’t be able to attend but we know he will be there in spirit.”