Historic Fair, Syrup Sopping Day Saturday

LOACHAPOKA – Members of the Lee County Historical Society are ready to welcome tens of thousands of visitors to the 38th annual Historic Fair and its Syrup Sopping Day across the highway in the tiny historic town of Loachapoka on Saturday.

On one side of the highway, they’re making syrup the “old timey way” under the new cooking pit and boiling it down to go on fresh baked, buttered biscuits. Along with crafts from 125 vendors, there will also be live music and wagon and pony rides.

Chairman Mathan Holt said they expect to serve 20,000 biscuits and syrup. They will also serve barbecue, fried peach and apple pies, roasted corn, cotton candy and pork skins.

Musical entertainment includes bluegrass and gospel from groups such as A Few Good Men and Holt and the Hired Hands.

Holt said although they advertise 7 a.m. as the start of the event, hot biscuits will be coming out of the ovens just after 5 a.m., so come early.

Across the way, Lee County’s oldest commercial building, the LCHS’ 1845 Trade Center, will be the hub for the Historical Fair.

LCHS President Deborah McCord said the fair continues its educational focus, which makes it a meaningful family activity.

“We want people to come out and see what we have, to let us teach them a little bit about our history and have these things preserved forever,” McCord said.

Children can partake in harvesting peanuts, sweet potatoes and sugarcane in the crops garden, and squeezing the sugarcane into sugarcane juice lemonade. They can also help squeeze fresh apples into apple cider which is free to all attending.

With plenty of food available, McCord said her favorites are the sweet potato biscuits and sweet potato fritters, which are perennial sell-outs. There will also be venison stew, beans, collard greens and barbecue. Others will be offering such things as pork rinds, cane syrup and cornmeal ground on site by a tractor-driven grist mill.

A full schedule of musical entertainment is planned on the stage, beginning at 8 a.m. Included are the Whistle Stop Pickers, whose dulcimer players call the museum home. Joining them throughout the day are Sweet Fern, Southern Fried Wanton, In Cahoots, the Heritage Singers, the Rowell Family, Saugahatchee Country and more.

The fair opens at 7 a.m. and ends at 4 p.m.  Admission, which benefits the museum, is $3 for adults and $1 for children. Children under 12 and adults over 90 are free. More information can be found at http://www.leecountyhistoricalsociety.org, or call Deborah McCord at 821-1301 or Charles Mitchell at 887-2255.