Event Name: DIY History Weekend
Date: July 20-21, 2024, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Location: West Overton Village
Address: 109 West Overton Road, Scottdale, PA, 15683
Admission: free
Event Name: Ice Cream Summer Fun Festival
Date: July 20-21, 2024, 9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Location: Fort Allen Antique Farm Equipment Association, Inc.
Address: 911 Porter Avenue, Scottdale, PA, 15683
Admission: free
DIY History Weekend at West Overton Village & Ice Cream Summer Fun Festival at Fort Allen
West Overton Village and Fort Allen Antique Farm Equipment Association are teaming up for a big weekend of FREE family-friendly fun! West Overton Village’s DIY History Weekend and Fort Allen Antique Farm Equipment Association’s Ice Cream Summer Fun Festival both invite you to enjoy historic activities, games, and crafts.
West Overton DIY History Weekend
At West Overton Village, enjoy activities inspired by life in the village in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Play with historic games and toys, make butter, and experiment with historic laundering tools including washboards and vintage washing machines. See demonstrations of historic laundry soap making and coopering. Visit the Summer Kitchen and taste refreshing vintage beverages.
At the Museum, visit “Forging Ahead and Falling Behind,” an award-winning, interactive exhibition that explores agriculture and industry through stories of individual workers at West Overton, including farmers, millers, coopers, miners, and more. Explore a hands-on grain harvest display featuring historic tools, along with a hands-on display from Rivers of Steel featuring steelworker protective gear and information about steelmaking. (Please note the Whiskey Heritage Center in our Museum will be closed and guided tours will not be offered over the weekend as we focus on activities).
On Saturday from 1 - 4 p.m. at West Overton Village, Pittsburgh Glass Center’s mobile glass studio, Hot Wheels, will be on site to get you fired up about glass! Get up close, feel the heat from the furnace, watch demonstrations, meet the artists, and learn about the science, art, and history of glass. Hot Wheels is a project of Pittsburgh Glass Center, a nonprofit school, studio, and gallery that encourages everyone from the casually curious to the master artists to learn, create, and be inspired by glass.
West Overton's Educational Distillery will also be open for rye whiskey samples, cocktails, and bottle purchases. West Overton Distilling produces the first rye whiskey at the historic site since Prohibition and is a stop on the Laurel Highlands Pour Tour.
Fort Allen Ice Cream Summer Fun Festival
At Fort Allen, explore a variety of displays and activities inspired by agricultural heritage. Visit displays of restored antique tractors and farming equipment, along with model trains and tractors. Enjoy a tractor parade each day at 1 p.m. each day, followed by a tractor rodeo on Saturday only.
Check out demonstrations of hit and miss engines, a shingle mill, and a saw mill. At the blacksmith shop, watch a blacksmith at work and try the hands-on rope making activity. Special children’s activities include a barrel train ride, corn play box, and crafts and games. Shop craft vendors and a flea market.
On Saturday at 2 p.m., ladies over 18 are invited to participate in the cast iron skillet toss contest (register at the registration building).
Work up an appetite with all the activities then enjoy homemade ice cream and other food and drinks at Fort Allen.
Plan your visit
West Overton Village and Fort Allen Antique Farm Equipment Association are neighbors. Fort Allen will provide a shuttle, and visitors can also walk or drive between the two sites.
A full schedule of events and activities will be available on both organizations’ websites, www.westovertonvillage.org and www.faafea.org.
Contact:
Pam Curtin
Director of Visitor Engagement
West Overton Village & Museum
724-887-7910 ext.102
109 W. Overton Rd., PO Box 3, Scottdale PA 15683
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About West Overton Village:
West Overton is a historic village that grew and industrialized around a whiskey distillery. Beginning as a family farm in 1803, the community boasted 50 buildings, including a general store, school, and post office by 1870. 250 people lived in West Overton and worked for the Overholt company's distillery, grist mill, coal mine, farm, and other businesses. West Overton native Henry Clay Frick left his fortune to his daughter, Helen Clay Frick, who purchased the property in 1922 as a way to memorialize her father.
Today, West Overton Village is a nonprofit organization that preserves 19 historic buildings across 40 acres and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The site is a rare surviving example of a rural industrial community. Visitors can tour the Overholt Homestead, the museum, as well as an educational distillery in which West Overton Village produces its own Monongahela rye whiskey for the first time since Prohibition. For more information, please visit https://www.westovertonvillage.org
About Fort Allen:
The Fort Allen Antique Farm Equipment Association, Inc. came into being as a result of the dedication of a few men to the restoration and preservation of antique farm equipment. Their aim was to educate current and future generations about the tools and methods their fathers and forefathers employed as they raised, clothes, nourished, and educated their families. That aim remains primary for the Association today. Incorporated in 1966, the association now boasts more than 400 members. For more information, please visit: https://www.faafea.org/
