Aug 14, 2010 - Fayette Historical Village



Snail Shell Harbor - Fayette State Park

 Today we went to Fayette State Park to visit the Historical Village there. Fayette was an iron smelting town in the 19^th century, and many of the old buildings are still standing, in various states of repair. The old hotel is still standing; when it was in operation it was equipped with a fancy-schmancy two-story outhouse. Also remaining are parts of the old coal burning power plant, machine shop, company store and several houses. The remains of the old piers are still visible too.

This weekend is their annual Heritage Days; they have organized activities for the kiddies like egg toss, croquet, hoop toss, sack races, watermelon eating contests, etc. Well, the parents can play too. They also have folks dressed in period costume scattered throughout the park, explaining what you’re seeing in front of you, and how the town and households in it functioned back in its glory days. Also available were horse-drawn carriage tours, a blacksmith demonstration, and the Escanaba City Band. If you got hungry, you could take advantage of the concessions being provided by local civic organizations (whitefish dinner, yum), or go to the park’s visitor center for some hand-dipped ice cream.



Inside the Charcoal Kiln



The harbor itself is pretty small and was crowded with private boats tied to the docks, but a significant part of the space was taken up by the tall ship Madeline, which was open for tours.

The blacksmith had a good fire going, and I kept circling back there hoping he’d be hammering on something so I could get some good photos. However, the entire time we were there he was occupied helping kids make interlocking puzzles out of two twisted horseshoe nails. He had a little jig clamped in his vise, and he’d show the kids how to set the nail in the jig just right, and then use a small pipe to bend the nail into a circle. Two of those make the interlocking puzzle. It went something like this:



Historical Reenactor Fayette SP



"Hokay, just drop da nail inna this little slot here, and make sure da head of da nail is up tight again dis liddle bump here. Den take dis here pipe, and sorta wrap da nail aroun like dis until ya bump up to dis little thing right here. Good job! Holy smokes, ya gotter bout perfect dere!"

He must have had a box of 50,000 horseshoe nails, and the line of kids stretched forever. So no blacksmith pictures. But he and the kids were both having a great time.

On the way back I was impressed with the sisu¹⁹ shown by the Yoopers. You do what ya gotta do to get by, like the sign in front of one business: “Holistic Medicine & Seasoned Firewood.” Or this one: “Small Equipment Repair”, and underneath that, “Homemade Pasties.” It looked like a lot of the locals had turned their crotches²⁰ into home businesses.

19. Loose translation of a Finnish word meaning endurance.    

20. It means garages. Get ur mind oudda da gutter!