Report on Heritage Festival 2010 Meeting

Dusty D just returned from a good meeting with about 20 folks who were involved with the 2009 Heritage Fest. It was actually a wrap-up of 2009, but with plans for 2010 too. It was interesting. And a good meeting, too--Ms. Hummel did an excellent job of keeping things on-task and moving.

Dusty D felt her face get red and HOT when I was singled out to speak. Land sakes, I used to be a teacher; you'd think I could speak in front of a group. And I did, outlining my four-part plan. I showed the group the book I'd checked out of the Archives packed with terrific info about past Heritage Festivals. I passed out a handout of a diagram of the past Living History setup (at left).

Then I spoke about our four-part plan and passed out its handout (picture, below). Our area will have four things:

1. Tinderbox Man (my husband, who will cheerfully tell you "I'm a pyro," not unlike his wife). Tinderbox Man has a tinderbox containing char cloth, a flint, and a striking steel. He will be demonstrating and helping kids with making fire without matches. My sweetie was so excited when he had this idea that all evening he was looking at Youtube videos on making char cloth and making a fire. Every time I passed his laptop, there was a video on with smoke pouring out of something.

2. Old Time Clothes Washing: this will need major props and prep. That's me, in the pic, in my bonnet. Now where did I put my giant cast iron cauldron?

3. "Grandma's Trunk": a trunk full of cornhusk dolls, old tools, neat old stuff kids can handle, with a docent there to ask good teacherly questions to get 'em to think about the stuff and what modern analogs are, &c.

4. Hands-On 19th-Century Games of "Graces" and horseshoes. Dunno why I drew my hubby in a sombrero in that pic. But anyways.

Highlights of the meeting chat:

1. One raffle winner did not claim their prize. It was a loaf of bread. The unclaimed prize was not wasted.
2. Next year's fest may feature a "Duck-Cam" in the rubber ducky race. Stay tuned.
3. Home tour had 350 advance tickets and 80 day-of tix sold.
4. Bed Race: allow gurneys?--they are made to go fast and may present an unfair advantage. Could be a serious problem.
5. Have a Heritage Fest Peace Force next year in bright yellow shirts? (In response to the big fight/rush of kids that took place).
6. Animals in petting zoo were "freaked out" by teens running by them during fight.
7. Over 300 runners in Great Train Race, a great #.
8. Garbage: sponsorships for each garbage can? ROTC kids running garbage had fun. Their favorite word, repeated ad infinitum during Fest, was "JUUUUUI-CY!" As in, "You run garbage, you get JUICY." Kids found a box of almonds behind almond booth, thought it was trash, whisked it away. Turns out it was a batch with double sugar that the owner had set aside because wrong recipe. Kids ate almonds, due to garbage-running's tendency to lower one's notions of food safety standards. "When you run garbage--it's OK." Kids got dizzy, then learned almonds hadn't been garbage. Uh-oh. Almond owner found out--instead of being mad, she offered them two new cones of almonds so kids could taste the RIGHT recipe. :D

And on that happy note, the group disbanded.

Secret postscript: our area will actually have 5 things. The 5th thing involves the first person to volunteer to help us. This gentleman, whom you may (or may not) know, will be a black-frock-coated Temperance Speaker AND Patent Medicine Salesman. It's still hush-hush as to his identity. But he would be perfect in this role and is enthusiastic, or possibly just afraid of me. Anyways, that's the roundup!