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Maryland Festival welcomes all who dig potatoes


WASHINGTON COUNTY, MD. - The Friends of the Rural Heritage Museum located at the Agricultural Education Center along the Sharpsburg Pike will be hosting their annual Spudfest, Heritage Fest and Cruise-In from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, August 27 and 28.

Spudfest

Spudfest is a free, full day festival on Saturday August 27, with special activities and features that spotlight the potato. Potatoes that were planted in the spring are harvested by a horse-drawn plow and children can "get dirty” in the patch as they pick up the crop. Children must register before 10:45 a.m. Potato picking starts at 11 a.m. There will be awards for the three largest potatoes in three age groups.

Visitors can sample homemade potato chips, see outdoor bread baking and enjoy garden trains, remote control trucks, mini-horses, barrel cart rides, Mr. Magic balloon animals, pedal tractor pull and games.

The Rural Heritage Museum is located at the Agricultural Education Center along the Sharpsburg Pike. All museum buildings and the village will be open during the Fest and there will be antique tractors, hit and miss engines, Master Gardeners activities and various demonstrations such as broom making, blacksmithing, wood working, butter churning, milking Miss Daisy, sawmill and stone crushing operations, fly fishing, beehive and honey making, corn shelling and grinding, weaving and spinning.

The Antique Tractor Club will host a tractor pull beginning at 4 p.m. A food stand will be open both days with a special potato-themed menu.  The 1899 Moller Pipe Organ from the Hagerstown Masonic Temple will be played on both afternoons.

Heritage Fest

Step back in time and visit Rural America at Heritage Fest, a free event beginning at 11 a.m. on August 28. The Rural Heritage Museum and Rural Village will be filled with demonstrators and activities, including most of the activities and demonstrators from Saturday and more. Visit the new Wood Working Shop and see how cabinets and buggies were made a century ago.

New for 2016, there will be a Cruise-In from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sunday during Heritage Fest on August 28. Everyone with cars they would like to display is invited. For more information call George Hammond at 240-520-9148.

For more information on Spudfest and Heritage Fest, call Doug Valentine at 301-790-0796.