On Saturday, June 25th, Hurry Hill Maple Farm and Museum will host its second annual Maple Farm to Table Picnic Dinner. The Hurry Hill Maple Museum will open at 5:00 PM. Participants can sample maple products in the Tasting Room and view the exhibit room dedicated to Virginia Sorensen’s “Miracles on Maple Hill – Where the Seasons Take on New Meaning.”
The indoor picnic dinner, catered by Nick’s Place, will begin at 6:00 PM. Items on the menu include maple pulled pork sandwich, maple baked beans, fresh fruit with maple dressing, maple lemon iced tea and farm potato salad, all topped off with a maple ice cream sundae for dessert.
Following the dinner, Florida playwright and Edinboro’s own Michael Hall (Edinboro High Class of ’58) will present a short, endearing vignette from Miracles on Maple Hill featuring “The First Maple Miracle.” This staged reading follows last year’s “Annie-Get-Your-Gun” and is based on early chapters of the Sorensen book that won the 1957 Newbery Medal for excellence in children’s literature.
Hall adapted the new scene that takes place in a northwest Pennsylvania sugarhouse. He will direct a six-member cast including special guest actor John Felix as the crusty maple syrup farmer Mr. Chris, and new cast member, Jake Triola, as Joe and Marly’s father, Dale. Other cast members include Bonnie Flynn, Gabe Bayle, Audrey Chemsak and Emma Nathanson.
Tickets for the dinner are $20 each. Reservations must be received by Monday, June 20th and can be made by calling Kathy Montgomery at 814-734-3562 or sending a check made out to Hurry Hill Maple Farm Museum Association to Montgomery Attn: Farm to Table Dinner, 114 Maple Drive, Edinboro, PA 16412. Additional information is available by calling 734-3562 or sending an email to gardebien@verizon.net.
Also on June 25th…
Tony Beigel, the hermit who lived on Mt. Pleasant and was an important character in Virginia Sorensen’s “Miracles on Maple Hill,” was known not only for his goat cheese and honey but also for the wooden chains he carved out of one piece of wood. Here, Tony proudly displayed an enormous chain draped over several of his bee hives. The chain was carved from a single log.
Janet Woods will be leading a narrated driving tour of the sites of Virginia Sorensen’s Miracles on Maple Hill on Saturday, June 25. Participants should plan to meet at the Edinboro Branch Library (Culbertson Stables Square on Route 6N west) at 9:00 AM. Touring will begin at 9:30. Those attending the tour should plan to carpool.
The two-hour tour will stop at several sites mentioned in the book and will culminate at the hermit’s house on Mount Pleasant where maple iced tea will be provided. Tony Beigel, known locally as the hermit, lived in a tiny house at the top of a steep road near Drake’s Mills between Edinboro and Cambridge Springs. It was there that he kept goats, made and sold goat cheese and honey.
The cost for the tour is $5 per person, payable that morning. The tour is limited to 40 people. Reservations are required and may be made by contacting gardebien@verizon.net or 814-734-3562 or hurryhillfarm@verizon.net or 814-572-1358 no later than Monday, June 20th. More information about the tour is also available at these sources.