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Saturday, September 19
Sunday, September 20, 2009


12:00 - 4:00 pm

Admission:
FREE for Members & Kids under 18
$5 for Non-member Adults*

*Become a member at the Festival
and admission is free!


Join us for Chippewa Nature Center's largest festival of the year! During this two-day event, the Nature Center comes alive with demonstrations and programs that focus on the autumn traditions of people in the 19th century.


Special thanks to our sponsors:

              


Programs at the Homestead area will include "Rambling Naturalists" Wil and Sarah Reding as Prairie Pete and Miss Sarah, portraying early Michigan settlers during several shows each day. Michigan food historian Susan Odom will demonstrate traditional apple butter making in a giant copper kettle.

  • Learn about Midland’s logging history at the Logging Sled near the sugarhouse.

  • A team of oxen from Tillers International will be plowing behind the schoolhouse and you'll have a chance to help with the process. You can also watch a three-horse team of Belgians plowing behind the wagon barn.

  • The Wigwam area will also be alive with traditional skills by Jim Miller, as he demonstrates ways Woodland Indians used autumn's bounty. The Oxbow Archaeologists will also have a display near the wigwam, where they are currently conducting excavations at the Naugle Site.

Other demonstrations include: Children's activities include:
threshing grain
cider making
beekeeping
woodworking
wool spinning
quilting
woodstove cooking
blacksmithing
herb-craft
traditional music
candle dipping
corn grinding
flailing
sorting and carding wool
yarn dolls
stenciling
stamping leather bookmarks
rope-making
schoolyard games

Food concessions will be also be available. Check out the latest inventory in CNC's store in the temporary Visitor Center, including gardening clogs and children's rain boots!

Activities subject to change.


Also ...
 
  • Check out the newly constructed Nature Preschool on
    Saturday and Sunday from 12-4 p.m.!



     
  • Pick up a Papa John's coupon card from CNC for just $5! The card includes a coupon for a FREE large pizza buy one get one offers and more — over $50 value! Stop by CNC during regular business hours or see us at the Festival to get yours!  
  • Also at the Festival, enter a raffle for just $1 to win two free pizzas every month for a year!
  • Book sale and signing with authors Ellie Schroeder and Dorothy Yates
What Can a Woman Do? A Young Abolitionist in the Michigan Territory

What can a woman do? More today, in 2009, than in the 1830s when a young Quaker abolitionist named Elizabeth Margaret Chandler immigrated to the Michigan Territory. A young woman in the 19th century could not try to do her part in righting the wrongs of the world using methods 21st century readers might consider obvious: letters to Congress, protest rallies and marches, mission trips to help the needy, running for office. Elizabeth Margaret Chandler, however, found a way. A revolutionary ahead of her time, she wrote and published hundreds of poems and essays — passionate protests against slavery. Hers was an anonymous voice out of the “backwoods” wilderness, laying the groundwork for Emancipation. What Can a Woman Do? A Young Abolitionist in the Michigan Territory is her biography, written by EllaMarie (Ellie) Schroeder and Dorothy Yates, available through Amazon.com and BookSurge.com. Much of the dialog and description in the book is quoted directly from letters to and from Elizabeth. Much of the day-to-day living information is fictionalized since the letters lack detail of mundane activities. The story is appropriate for readers age 12 and up.