The Cordell Hull Birthplace State Park will show visitors Saturday what life was like for sharecroppers more than 200 years ago.
Park Manager Monique Johnson said the annual event showcases a variety of demonstrations including blacksmithing, wet plate photography, cooking and weaving. She said the work focuses on the skills needed to survive.
“I think it’s important to remember where we came from, and how much, how hard people worked back in the 1870s,” Johnson said. “You couldn’t just go to the store and buy certain things, they had to be made and so I think it’s very important that we understand how things were done and how things were made.”
Johnson said the idea for Historic Market Day came to her a few years ago when she and others were trying to think of a hands-on experience for park goers.
“It’s one thing to kind of talk about these skills, it’s another to be able to visually see them,” Johnson said. “And so we think it’s important especially for children to be able to see these skills at hand an learn about them. I know, I’m a very visual kind of hands-on person and so you can talk about something all day, but when I see it, that’s when it connects.”
Johnson said the day is made up of a Johnson said these skills are not yet extinct.
“These crafts are thriving,” Johnson said. “You can go to the Appalachian Craft Center and take classes on them. There’s a whole group of individuals that are keeping these crafts still alive today.”
Johnson said the park has worked to add something new each year. This year, Johnson said, a ranger will talk about the state’s cotton mill industry and a living historian will demonstrate churning butter.
The Historic Market Day is this Saturday from 10am to 4pm at the Cordell Hull Birthplace State Park in Byrdstown.
