The public is invited to the annual Heritage Day fundraiser at Eagle Iron Works and Curtin Village Sunday, August 9, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. -- a celebration of traditional crafts and frontier ingenuity.
Throughout Heritage Day, visitors of all ages will have the opportunity to interact with traditional artisans such as tin smith Ken Smith, shoemaker Rich Watters, blacksmith Seth Green and charcoal maker Paul Fagley as they revive lost arts.
Visitors will also be able to discover the evolution of women’s aprons through the decades with Linda Wilson, tour the iron furnace, play old-fashioned children’s games and stroll through the restored herb garden with a Penn State Extension Master Gardener.
Heritage Day visitors can purchase Ice Shack ice cream sandwiches and lunch prepared on site from Lock Haven based Old Corner Grill and Bar.
Back by popular demand will be the Pop-up Civil War Museum, opening at 3 p.m. This is a temporary exhibit created by the people who show up to share a personal story or a Civil War era object. Local historians will aid in answering questions, identifying objects and facilitating conversation.
Admission to the Heritage Day fundraiser is $5 per individual for all persons over the age of 10. Tickets can be purchased at the gate.
All proceeds benefit the preservation, interpretation and maintenance of Eagle Iron Works and Curtin Village, a 501(c) 3 managed by volunteers through The Roland Curtin Foundation.
Featured this year at Heritage Day will be Paul Fagley, long-time environmental education specialist at Greenwood Furnace State Park. Fagley will demonstrate nineteenth-century charcoal making and share his insights from over 30 years of research and education experience related to the renowned Juniata Iron District.
Eagle Iron Works was the District’s longest and last operating charcoal-fired iron production and processing facility. With its many original and replicated structures, Eagle Iron Works and Curtin Village is the only place in Pennsylvania where visitors can view all major components of an old-time iron-making plantation.
The Foundation hopes to raise $3260 – a dollar for each pound of the last piece of charcoal fired, cold-blast iron made in Pennsylvania, and possibly the nation. The 1.5-ton slab of partly smelted pig iron was recovered from Eagle Furnace during its 1976-78 reconstruction. The slab rests today beside the reconstructed casting house, a fitting memorial to an important chapter in Pennsylvania’s industrial history.
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