Webster Fall Festival

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At the general store (which Little Brother thinks is owned by "the general"), they are selling real, old-fashioned, handcrafted wooden pop guns and not-so-old-fashioned but still handcrafted wooden ping pong ball shooters made by an eighty-seven-year-old Webster resident. We visit the original Webster Township Hall where we read about Webster's namesake, statesman Daniel Webster. We spend a long time at the one-room Podunk Schoolhouse (its real name), built in 1838, where the children take turns playing teacher, writing on real slates with graphite pencils, and trying on the dunce cap. ("What's a dunce?")

At 5 p.m., the famous Webster pig roast begins. Everyone lines up for this German feast of roast pig, potatoes, carrots, sauerkraut, applesauce, popover, and cake. The children are nervous about the sauerkraut--their least favorite food--until they discover that children are allowed to choose--sauerkraut or applesauce. Suddenly they are as cheerful as the bluegrass music enveloping us.   

[Originally published in September, 2010.]