The Spring Heritage Festival is a one-day event at the Great Smoky Mountains Heritage Center in Townsend, TN, that capsulizes the history of the region through a variety of live presentations. These include oral life histories by former park residents, demonstrations highlighting skills such as basket and broom making, chair caning, iron forging, open hearth cooking, quilting, doll making, beekeeping, woodcarving, log splitting, atlatl throwing and much more. The day's music varies, just as it did in pre-park days, from the toe-tapping tunes of mountain strings to the more recent bluegrass to the ancient, haunting Native American flute. In addition, today's children have the opportunity to experience games and play that their counterparts 200 years and more ago did to entertain themselves. All events take place at the Heritage Center, in and around the main building and throughout the many historic structures on the center's grounds. |