Foxfire gearing up for annual event Heritage Day

June 17, 2019 Chad Dorsett

For anyone wishing they could travel back in time to see how their ancestors used to live in the great Appalachians, Saturday will be the perfect opportunity.

Executive Director of Foxfire TJ Smith invites everyone to attend the upcoming annual Heritage Day which will be taking place June 22 from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

The festivities will take place at The Foxfire Museum & Heritage Center located right beneath Black Rock Mountain State Park in Mountain City.

Smith said the event will feature a full day of interpretive demonstrations of weaving, blacksmithing, basketry, open-hearth cooking, broom making, bark berry baskets, corn shuck dolls, early engines and much more.

Heritage Day, which has been a reoccurring festival for nearly ten years, also allows the public insight on Foxfire’s operations and origination.

Foxfire, now a non-profit organization, began in 1966 at the Rabun Gap-Nacoochee School where students were allowed the opportunity to create a magazine, honing their writing skills on stories gathered from their families and neighbors, and producing articles about the pioneer era of southern Appalachia as well as living traditions still thriving in the region.

Since then, The Foxfire Magazine has been in continuous production since first published in 1967.

Today, Smith said, students in the Foxfire classroom at Rabun County High School produce two double-issues each school year, focusing on the remarkable stories and extraordinary talents of people in the surrounding communities and beyond, and on living cultural traditions and Appalachian heritage. Additionally, Foxfire Today is an exciting new digital publication created by 5th and 6th-grade students from Rabun County Elementary and Middle Schools. It follows in the footsteps of The Foxfire Magazine and involves project-based learning.

For anyone wishing to gain insight into the Appalachia lifestyle, tickets can be purchased at the door, day of. Adults are $10, young people 7 to 17 are $5, kids 6 and under are free.