Pioneer Heritage Day at Jesse Jones Park

 
 

Above are two photos from the recent Pioneer Heritage Day at Jesse Jones Park in Spring, Texas.

The top photo is of the southern Rebel troops practicing close order drill while the second is of the Union soldiers firing on the southern troops during a raid on the farmstead.

The re-enactment this year was a generic raid on a southern farmstead by Union soldiers which began with the raiding of the chicken coop, included manumitting a slave and generally terrorizing the women and children of the farmstead until the rebel troops came out of the woods to chase the Union soldiers away.

Along with the battle re enactment in the afternoon, the day included living heritage demonstrations of life on the homestead including bread baking, quilting, gun smithing, black smithing, laundry, children's games, campfire cooking and baking, meat smoking, gardening spinning and weaving.

Unlike last year's demonstration which was 40 degrees, cold, damp and windy, this year's demonstration was 65, sunny and still.

Phil and I along with fellow Tall Pines Spinners and Weavers members Jane, Julia and Sally spent the day demonstrating weaving, wheel spinning, needle felting and spindle spinning. Forewarned by the chill of last year's demonstration I had the foresight this year to wear long underwear and take along my heaviest shawl. The air was balmy but the chill coming off the woods, in the shadows and off the ground was still present. In spite of the residual chill it was the most spring like day we've seen so far this year. There was even one tiny little bradford pear tree putting out about half a dozen tiny popcorn white flower buds.

Phil got a lot spun on his hand spindle, and needle felted a small sheep out of some scrap wool, I got about 400 yards of churro spun up on my Navajo spindle, while Julia filled her bobbin with hand carded gulf coast native fleece. Sally was spinning some generic white wool and Jane got a lot of weaving on the old restored loom done so it was a productive and pleasant day all around.