DEWAYNE HOLLOWAY|dewayne@mcnews.online
CADDO GAP – Everyone is invited to come see what life was like in the “good old days” this Saturday, October 2, at the Caddo Gap Heritage Festival held at the Gap Mercantile in Caddo Gap.
The historic Gap Mercantile general store was originally opened in 1932 and is one of the most unique businesses in Montgomery County. It will serve as the heart of the Caddo Gap Heritage Festival. The festival highlights our southern heritage amid the Ouachita Mountains.
Event organizer Gary McWilliams shared that “This family-friendly festival is unique in Arkansas, in that it seeks to preserve and promote the old time skills, crafts, and lifestyle of the Ouachita Mountain settlers and natives in southwest Arkansas from the period of early settlement in the 1800’s up until about the 1940’s.”
The festival will feature vendors selling homemade or handmade items that fit the general theme of the festival. There will also be a select number of handpicked demonstrations that feature life in earlier times. These demonstrations include a host of old-fashioned skills, chores, and exhibits: blacksmithing, wool-spinning, weaving, broom-making, quilting, tatting, log hewing, shingle making, Native American crafts, flintknapping, antique tractors/engines/cars, herbs and medicinal plants, along with Civil War re-enactments.
This year’s event will feature demonstrations by the Red Diamond Camp #2193 of Texarkana, Texas, a Civil War artillery unit armed with a cannon which they’ll fire every hour during the festival.
The festival is family friendly and free to everyone. It will begin at 9 a.m. Saturday, October 2.
The Gap Mercantile is located in downtown Caddo Gap just off Highway 27/8 between Glenwood and Norman.
Caddo Gap Heritage Festival brings past to life Saturday
