The annual Mountain Life Festival at the Mountain Farm Museum in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park will be from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 17.

All activities are free and open to the public. The centerpiece of the event is the sorghum syrup demonstration, which the national park has provided each fall for more than 35 years. The syrup is made much the same way it was a hundred or more years ago using a horse-powered cane mill and wood-fired cooker. The syrup making demonstration is presented by students, staff, and volunteers from Swain County High School through a cooperative agreement with GSMNP and the Great Smoky Mountains Association. The association is the Park’s non-profit partner that operates the bookstores in the Park’s visitor centers.

Other activities during the day will include hearth cooking, hominy making, apple butter, apple cider, soap making and traditional toys. Tools, farm implements, and historic photographs from the national park’s archives and artifact collection will also be on display. Several local musicians will provide live music. Featured at this year’s event will be Ron and Suzanne Joyner from Big Horse Creek Farm in Ashe County. Their small family-owned orchard and nursery maintains more than 300 varieties of custom-grafted heirloom apple trees. The Joyners will have information on the preservation of antique varieties of apples.

The purpose of the Mountain Life Festival is to share with park visitors some of the traditional fall activities that were an important part of rural life in the southern mountains. The spirit of cooperation that existed among families and neighbors is reflected in this event.

The Mountain Farm Museum is located adjacent to the park’s Oconaluftee Visitor Center on US 441 in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, two miles north of Cherokee. For more information call the visitor center at 828.497.1904.