VINTON–Vinton will be holding its first Heritage and Storytelling Festival on Saturday, May 14, at the Vinton History Museum and also cross the street at the Vinton Public Library.
The Vinton Historical Society is partnering with the library and the Town of Vinton to put on the event which is scheduled to last from 10 a.m. until 5 p.m.
Activities are scheduled in both locations.
The library events will take place in the second floor meeting rooms. At 10 a.m. Victoria Last Walker Ferguson, author of “Dark Moon to Rising Sun,” a true American Indian story, will be speaking.
Author Becky Mushko follows at 11 a.m. with “The Story Behind the Story.” She has written “Them That Go” and “Stuck.” Her stories are set in the Appalachian Mountains.
At 1:00 Michael Pulice will talk about brick architecture in the Roanoke Valley and beyond. In recent months he completed a preliminary assessment of Vinton’s Gish’s Mill.
Storyteller Shannon Brooks, who is a columnist for the “Franklin News Post,” and a beekeeper, hunter, and fisherwoman will share some tales.
The renowned Jack Tale Storytellers from Ferrum College will be appearing at 3 p.m. They are a traveling theatre troupe who present entertaining and educational plays including traditional music and stories of the Blue Ridge Mountains.
The library will be showing the movie “Tall Tale,” on the rooftop patio at noon.
Meanwhile, across the street at the Vinton History Museum, a variety of activities will be ongoing—museum tours, a 1750’s Frontier Life Encampment, a quilting demonstration, and a pottery demonstration by Jim Privatera of Earthworks Pottery, which is located just down the street in Vinton.
Museum members will be available to talk about family history resources and the sale of “Memorial Pergola Commemorative Bricks” to be placed at the History Museum.
Dean Ferguson will talk about “Life along the Great Wagon Road.” Victoria Last Walker Ferguson will speak about Native American Life. Vinton’s historian Barbara Dillon will talk about the “Good Old Days in Vinton.”
Concessions will be available from Star City Succotash on the museum grounds and in the Land of a Thousand Hills Coffee Shop on the mezzanine level of the library.
The museum and library are both located in downtown Vinton. Parking is available at the library and in the other downtown parking lots and along the streets.
More information is available by calling the Vinton History Museum at 857-8634 or by email at info@VintonHistoryMuseum.org.
