Return to Lang Pioneer Village

Villages have an unmistakable charm. There is a subtle magic found in villages. The earthiness, greenery, and fragrance of flowers, plants, fruits, and vegetables growing in the field is breathtakingly inimitable. Sitting in the lush green fields, while gazing at the wide blue sky, amidst the farm animals and the simple houses in the background, is a joie de vivre.
― Avijeet Das

Accounts of eating Christmas sweet potatoes baked in ashes and jackrabbit stewed with white flour dumplings are testaments to pioneer resilience and pleasure - and they help inspire my own best scratch cooking.
— Isabel Gillies

It is not easy to be a pioneer - but oh, it is fascinating! I would not trade one moment, even the worst moment, for all the riches in the world.
— Elizabeth Blackwell

My return to Lang Pioneer Village did not get off to a good start. I got my costume in plenty of time, and it fit perfectly. I had my apron, shoes, and stockings. I put my hair in a braid because I couldn’t find any bobby pins to put it in a bun – there were no plastic claw clips in pioneer days.

However, I forgot the address of the lady I was picking up, so I had to look it up online. This meant going through my emails to find the one from a year ago with everyone’s contact information in it.

Lang Pioneer Village is on the north side of Rice Lake. There is no easy way to get to it, you have to go out of your way to either the east or the west. I prefer taking the western route because it’s more familiar and I don’t have to pass through the cannabis corridor (a long section of highway that passes through the Alderville reservation and is littered with stores selling cannabis).

I turned left, thought I was going in the wrong direction, turned around. Then I realized I was supposed to go left, so I turned around again and we were off. Then I realized I’d forgotten the map I’d printed out. D’oh!

Somehow, I remembered just enough from last year to get us there. Whew! Then I realized I’d also forgotten the spiffy site map I’d printed out. And my big water bottle. And the glasses I need to wear when I’m doing stitchery. *sigh*

Once we were there we discovered something shocking. THERE WAS NO COFFEE! Not a drop – not for staff, not for volunteers, not for visitors. I guess they figured because it was summer people wouldn’t want anything hot to drink. They were wrong.

They were a little more concerned with authenticity this year, so I didn’t get a lot of pictures because the pockets of my apron weren’t big enough to hold my phone. And before the village opened to visitors, a woman in a ATV raced through the village dispensing mason jars for everyone to drink out of so that water bottles could be hidden away.

There was definitely a lot more going on that last year. There was a cheese shop, the spinning and yarn dyeing, a wagon ride, a display by the Peterborough Agricultural Society, broom making, weaving, a spring pole lathe demonstration, demonstration of using a washing board, and on the village green there was my group of stitchers, a rug hooking group, and a lady who was repairing and filling straw mattresses. There was also an on-going corn roast, games and crafts involving corn for the kids, dyeing demonstrations using corn and corn flowers, and freshly popped kettle corn.

I think my favorite was the corn grinding demonstration. The corn is first dried in a corn crib, then husked. The dried corn cob is put into this grinder and when you turn the crank the kernels are stripped from the cob. The naked cobs are set aside to be used in the fire in the smoke house, and the kernels are put into one of the two grinders (they looked like the meat grinder my mother used to have). One ground them into corn meal, the other had a coarser texture.

Lots to see and do, and save for the lack of coffee and the hardness of the chairs we were sitting on, a good time was had by all. But there are a few things I must remember for next year’s visit:

Bring a basket big enough to hide a thermos (or two!) of coffee and something to drink it out of like a tin cup or porcelain tea cup.
Re-do the pockets on my apron so they’re bigger, and lower down.
Bring a cushion to sit on.

I’m already looking forward to next year!