We just opened here at the fort a couple of days ago. The weather has been about perfect, sunny but not too warm, and with great cumulus clouds sailing slowly overhead to temper the sun. A
lready busloads of children are arriving, and will keep arriving nearly every day until the end of the school year. In addition to the influx of visitors we have some new permanent tenants here at fort. Two ewes, one ram, two lambs, and one very small kitten, named after the Shawnee queen, Aliquippa. They are all so new they have yet to receive their names, but they are here to stay. They will live inside the fort, from spring until winter, when they find warmer homes at the farm of our senior interpreter, Judy Wilson.
When you visit the fort, especially if you are one of the young students arriving on a bus, Judy is probably the interpreter you will see first. She is a tall, striking, mature woman in period clothing which she has made herself, and she has a commanding presence. She will be the one who tells you the history of the Prickett family and the western Virginia frontier as you stand outside the fort with all your classmates. Once you are inside, if you are very lucky, you will get to meet her loyal companion, Quincy the sheepdog, who is very well-behaved and who only comes out to greet visitors from his secret hideaway behind the 18th-century loom when Judy gives him permission. You will probably never meet anyone who knows more about the life of wome
n on the frontier than Judy. She knows how to shear sheep, wash and card the wool, spin and weave it into cloth, and cut and sew the cloth into shawls. Similarly she grows her own flax, beats and draws out the flax fibers to spin into thread which she then weaves into linen and sews into shirts.
You will probably also meet our venerable militiaman, Okey Simmons, and there is nothing he does not know about the stoney-hard life of a civilian militiaman on the 18th-century frontier. He will load and fire a blackpowder flintlock musket with an enormous bang that will make you jump, and then start a fire in his bare hands with nothing but flint and steel, and as you watch he will roll the fire up and put it in his pocket. And I’m not kidding! I’ve seen him do it a hundred times.
In addition to our new furry tenants at the fort, there are other major changes afoot. Between the Visitors Center and the Fort you will probably notice a new/old building (newly erected from early 19th-century timbers), nestled back along the woods. This is the Bray Blacksmith Shop, and if you see black coalsmoke pouring from one of the chimneys, you will know that Greg Bray is hard at work, pulling on the huge bellows suspended from ceiling-beams and hammering red-hot iron into axes, hoes and knives. You will meet very few fellows here at the fort who know more about frontier life than Greg Bray, and he knows it thoroughly, from the bottom up. He not only knows most everything there is to know about firing and hunting with flintlock muskets and rifles, for instance, he knows how to make them from scratch, and has built some eighty blackpowder firearms in his day, as well as countless knives, tomahawks and ironware of every sort. If there’s anything you want to know about frontier weaponry or ironmongery, Greg’s your man.
Well, I could go on and on, but it’s way past my bedtime, and I’ve got to get up bright and early tomorrow to get to the fort. So goodbye and good-night. My name’s Bradley, by the way, though my wife just calls me “The Bear”, and you can too.
