WALLA WALLA -- More than halfway through its summer events schedule, things got all fired up this weekend as the annual blacksmith demonstration hammered away at the Whitman Mission National Historic Site.
Longtime Tri-Cities farrier Ron Ginder, 69, now retired, lugged his 80-pound and 100-year-old Peter Wright anvil, along with an even older old crank bellows and coal tray, a load of coal, several tools and samples of his work to demonstrate how horseshoes would have been made at the Whitman Mission well over a century ago.
"There was nothing light involved about blacksmithing. Everything about it was heavy," said Renee Rusler, park ranger at the mission.
Each weekend from June through August, the Whitman Mission hosts educational events. Most are demonstrations of what life would have been like at the mission back in its heyday in the 1840s.
But the National Historic Site also includes demonstrations of some more modern happenings, like this coming weekend's Stinky Soil and Solar Power demonstration, where patrons will be treated to demonstrations of the state-of-the-art solar technologies used at the facility, as well as some good old fashioned composting.
To learn more about the Whitman Mission summer events, go online to nps.gov/whmi or call 529-2761.
Cost to tour the park for a day is $3, 16 and older. Children get in free.
Alfred Diaz can be reached at alfreddiaz@wwub.com or 526-8325.
Comments
Use the comment form below to begin a discussion about this content.
Sign in to comment