Shear delight
Museum event draws a big crowd
Visitors watch a sheep getting a shearing during last Friday’s Sheep Shearing Days event at the Museum of Appalachia in Norris. The event will be repeated this coming Friday (May 9) from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the museum, on Andersonville Highway east of Interstate 75, Exit 122. The shearers are Baylee Brown, left, and Alice Ogan of B&B Livestock in Clinton. (photo:G. Chambers Williams III )
The event returns this coming Friday to conclude this year’s activities, and will run from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. again.
At the heart of the event are the sheep-shearing demonstrations and activities associated with wool gathering and processing, along with numerous other exhibits, entertainment and demonstrations centered around pioneer life in Appalachia.
During last week’s event, schoolkids taking the day off from the classroom appeared to be having great fun on their Museum of Appalachia field trip, taking part in activities that included buck dancing.
They also were kept entertained by “old-fashioned games” that “helped get the kids’ energy out,” said Director of Development Will Meyer, grandson of the museum’s founder, the late John Rice Irwin.
“It was a really great day,” Meyer said. “We were fortunate that the [rainy] weather just missed us. We had about 1,500 public school kids, and lots of families. There were several Mennonite groups who showed up, also.
“We had more demonstrations than ever before,” he said. “We tried to fill every cabin with a demonstration.”
Colonial historian Rob Poston was on hand with several members from Tennesseans for Living History, giving presentations about the early history of East Tennessee, Meyer said.
“New demonstrations and exhibits included the Anderson County Tractor Club, cornhusk dollmaker Dorothy McMillan and more,” he said.
The Museum of Appalachia bluegrass band, led by John Alvis, led the musical entertainment from the museum’s outdoor stage.
That included clog dancers Kylee and Sadie Alvis, who are John Alvis’ granddaughters, Meyer said. They are also student athletes at Lincoln Memorial University.
Leo Collins, who runs a Christmas tree farm on Brushy Valley Road, was also on hand, leading kids in buck dancing in front of the stage when he wasn’t on the stage singing along with the museum’s band.
Meyer said the weather is looking good for this coming Friday’s second and final day of this year’s Sheep Shearing Days, with a 20% chance of rain in the forecast.
Besides the shearing, there will be spinners and weavers on hand so visitors can see how wool is made into finished products, Meyer said.
The Museum of Appalachia has been holding the event for more than 10 years, Meyer said.
“This is among the few events that are big boosters for us and help us showcase some of the Appalachian traditions,” he said.
Tickets are $20 for adults (18 and up); $18 for people 65 or older, military or first-responders; and $10 for ages 6-17. A family pass is $50, which includes two adults and up to six children. Kids under 6 are free with a parent. Museum members are also admitted free.
Admission also includes tours of the museum farm and village, which contain some three-dozen historic log structures, exhibit halls filled with thousands of Appalachian artifacts, working gardens, and farm animals, according to the museum website.
