Nevada County Picayune and Gurdon Times Newspaper Archive

Museum Holding 29th Annual Holiday Open House

The Arkansas Territorial Restoration museum invites the public to its 29th annual Christmas Frolic open house, ATR director, Bill Worthen announced. The free celebration will take place from 1 to 4:30 p.m. Sunday, December 8, and will feature living history of performances, holiday music, an archeological dig and free cider and gingercake. The Territorial Restoration, located at 200 East Third Street in downtown Little Rock, is an agency of the department of Arkansas Heritage.

Children performing as living history actors will offer 19th-century children's perspectives on the holidays in the museum's four restored houses, in short scenes built around the frontier Christmas experience. At the Hinderliter Grog Shop, Little Rock's oldest builiing, the Arkansas Country Dance Society will teach frontier dances such as the Virginia Reel. Lark in The Morning will perform traditional holiday music in the visitors center lobby.

The Arkansas Archeological Survey will conduct an archeological dig in the yard of the Woodruff Print Shop, on the site where the Arkansas Gazette was printed in the 1820s. Visitors can witness the dig and ask questions. Inside the reconstructed print shop, visitors can learn how the Gazette was originally printed by hand.

Outside, children can play frontier games such as hoop-rolling, stilt- walking, and rope-jumping. They can string popcorn and cranberries and make cotton-ball angels. Visitors can stroll the grounds admiring the historic houses' Christmas decorations, or watch demonstrations of campfire cooking and taste hot biscuits and roasted peanuts.

Members of the Arkansas Travelers Storytelling Society will tell holiday tales in the Plum Bayou Log House, where hot spiced cider and gingercake will be served. Frontier re-enactors will camp out on the lawn of the Log House.

Inside the reception center, visitors can see the new traveling exhibit, "The Finest Hisgh School For Negro Boys and Girls": A History of Dunbar High School in Little Rock, 1929-1955. The traveling exhibit is sponsored by the National Dunbar History Project, a collaboration between the National Dunbar Alumni Associaton, the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR) Public History program, and the Archives/Special Collections of UALR's Ottenheimer Library.

The Christmas Frolic Open House provides a perfect opportunity for holiday gift shopping at the museum's Arkansas'made crafts store. Hand- made quilts, wood carvings, corn husk dolls, white oak baskets and dried flower arrangements are available, along with the work of local artists and a wide selection of cookbooks.

The Christmas Frolic in the past has seen a two-day affair. This year it is shortened to one afternoon only, and timed to coincide with the open houses of several other Little Rock museums.

The Arkansas Territorial Restoration opens its doors daily to the state's oldest neighborhood. Guided tours of four early 19th-century houses are given hourly from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. (except noon), Monday through Friday and from 1 to 5 p.m. on Sundays. Tours are $2 for adutls, $1 for seniors citizens and 50 cents for children.

The Department of Arkansas Heritage oversees seven state agencies: Arkansas Territorial Restoration, Arkansas Arts Council, Delta Cultural Center, Arkansas Natural and Scenic Rivers Commission, Arkansas Natural Heritage Commission, Arkansas Historic Preservation Program and Arkansas Commemorative Commission, which directs the work of the Old State House and Trapnall Hall.