Stepping into the swaying grasses and native Indiana wildflowers outside the Trafalgar library, the neighborhoods and roadways fade away, leaving you alone in the prairie.
If you close your eyes, you can imagine what life was like for the pioneers who made Johnson County their home. The sounds of blacksmiths pounding tools and horseshoes. The smells of down-home baking and pies cooling on windowsills. Farmers using horse-drawn plows to turn up the land.
You have to use your imagination to see that now. But on June 8, you’ll be able to experience it in person.
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The Johnson County Public Library is inviting people to come back to the grasslands with its second annual Library on the Prairie Pioneer Festival. The history-based program will transport visitors to the mid-1800s for a celebration of pioneer life. Watch a blacksmith shape the tools that made prairie life possible. Learn about carpentry, butter churning, quilting and beekeeping from local experts.
Listen to stories in a recreated one-room schoolhouse, and listen to the heartfelt folk songs and spirituals from the Freetown Village Singers.
“Pioneer life is a subject that resonates with children. They like to think about the challenge of surviving when you didn’t have your screen, so it’s kind of an adventure,” said Sarah Taylor, programming manager for the Johnson County Public Library. “We want to go back to seeing what that ‘simpler’ but really quite difficult life was like.”
The Library on the Prairie event was unveiled in 2018 as an event to generate interest and bring the community together for a look at our local heritage, Taylor said.
As part of the Explore Summer program at the library, it showcased traditional crafts, games, entertainment and other aspects of pioneer life. In addition, organizers were also searching for a way to expand the use of the native Indiana prairie that had been planted when the Trafalgar branch opened in 2007.
The prairie resembles the grassy plains that were common in Johnson County and elsewhere throughout Indiana in the past.
“With the different plant and animal species that call it home, it’s a beautiful area for us to use,” Taylor said. “It’s a unique feature for a library to be located on a prairie like that, and have such a beautiful space. We really wanted to have a program where we could utilize that space.”
Last year, nearly 600 people attended the festival. Organizers hope to build on that success by adding new features and expanding some of the favorites.
At the center of the event will be a unique slate of performers. Library officials received a grant from Festival Country Indiana, the county’s tourism board, which allowed organizers to bring in talented singers and dancers to entertain the crowds.
From the bluegrass folk of Roger Banister and the D3R Band to fleet feet of Old Time Country Dance and Rhythm Chasers Cloggers, the different styles will keep people tapping their toes.
To close out the festival, the Freetown Village Singers will share the culture and tradition of African American storytelling and song in a special headlining concert.
“That will be a really exciting performance that a lot of people will enjoy, so we’re going to shut down most of our booths so people can sit and enjoy it together,” Taylor said.
The working blacksmith, antique farm machinery and crafts were all wildly popular with people and have been brought back. Guided tours of the prairie by representatives from the Department of Natural Resources are designed to give people a better understanding of the biology of a prairie. Guests can learn more about the working beehives housed at the Trafalgar library.
Hope-based Utopia Wildlife Rehabilitators will bring rescued animals for people to interact with that call the prairie home.
“They can see some of those animals up close and personal,” Taylor said.
The early pioneers relied on agriculture to survive, and farming is still an integral part of Johnson County. Different programs will teach about that aspect, including a presentation by Jennifer Campbell from Campbell Grain and Livestock.
The Campbell family has been farming in the county for generations, and wants to share what agriculture means to her family and to everyone’s life.
“They came here in the 1800s, homesteaded the land. So she’s going to talk a little bit about the history there, as well as focusing on where farming is at today,” Taylor said. “We want to spend some time talking about what the farmers in our community are doing for us.”
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Library on the Prairie Pioneer Festival
When: 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. June 8
Where: Trafalgar library, 424 S. Tower St.
Cost: Free
Information: pageafterpage.org/library-on-the-prairie-pioneer-festival
Schedule
All day events:
- Listen to live music
- Visit the antique farm machinery show
- Watch a blacksmith at work
- Quilting demonstrations with Nimble Thimble
- Ma & Pa Mercantile
- Crafts
11-11:30 a.m.: One Room Schoolhouse Storytime
11 a.m.-noon: Rhythm Chasers Clogging Group
11 a.m.-2 p.m.: Indian Creek FFA ice cream machine
11:30 a.m.-noon: "Civil War: You’re in the Army Now"
11:30 a.m.-1 p.m.: Carpentry with Miss Annemarie
11:30 a.m.-3 p.m.: Animals on the Prairie with Utopia Wildlife Rehabilitators
Noon-12:30 p.m.: One Room Schoolhouse Storytime
Noon-1 p.m.: Old-time country dance
12:30-1 p.m.: "Civil War: Uniform and Equipment of the Civil War Soldier"
1-1:30 p.m.: One Room Schoolhouse Storytime
1-2 p.m.: Churning butter with Miss Amy
1-2 p.m.: Pie contest drop off
1-3 p.m.: Roger Banister and D3R Bluegrass Band
1-3 p.m.: Guided tours of the prairie
1:30-2 p.m.: "Civil War: Franklin Thompson, Master of Disguise"
2-2:30 p.m.: One Room Schoolhouse Storytime
2-2:30 p.m.: Bees at Trafalgar
2-3 p.m.: Pie contest judging
2-3 p.m.: "Our Agricultural Roots," farming in Johnson County with Jennifer Campbell of Campbell Grain & Livestock
2:30-3 p.m.: "Civil War: You’re in the Army Now"
3-3:30 p.m.: Pie contest winners announced
3:30-4:30 p.m.: Freetown Village Singers
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