Nearly 1,000 guests come out for Camp Fort Hill Fall Event

STURGIS — Weather was right Saturday for the annual Camp Fort Hill Fall Event.

In fact, it was so good that nearly 1,000 guests attended, making for the greatest participation in the event to date.

Camp Fort Hill director Dave Ludders called the fall event “unbelievable.”

“It just keeps growing,” he said of the yearly celebration of fall, stating that about 100 people attended the inaugural fall event less than 10 years ago.

There was much to offer in the line of entertainment Saturday from wagon rides to kayaking, bounce houses, pumpkin decorating, face painting, kids' games, live music, s’mores, pontoon rides, popcorn, food trucks and more.

Inside the 1850s Sturgis family log cabin, Deanna Earl and Becky Podoll of Quincy could be found demonstrating basket weaving.

Each year, a different skill of the time period is offered up at the event, explained Jeanne Ludders, who could be found preparing cherry cobbler in the cabin’s wood burning cook stove.

Earl explained that each basket serves a different purpose. For example, one might be for herb gathering, she said, while another might be for taking to the market.

Owen Rice, 2, of Three Rivers, was among those to see the demonstration. He was attending the fall event with his grandma Lisa Kinsman, also of Three Rivers. Kinsman was an old friend of Earl and Podoll. They used to work together at Sturgis Hospital and would square dance together at Camp Fort Hill “many moons ago,” Kinsman said.

“That was a blast,” Earl said, adding that she had many memories of the camp.

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Earl got into basket weaving back when “everyone was buying Longaberger baskets,” she said. Depending on the size of the basket, one can be made in one or two hours, or half a day. Earl and Podoll get together to do so, but mostly talk.

“That’s the fun of it,” Earl said. “You can put it down and come back to it later.”

Outside the cabin, a new deck surrounding it could be seen. The wood used to create the deck was taken from downed Camp Fort Hill trees from the big storm that ripped through the area in August of last year. Dave Ludders explained that the deck was constructed in a manner consistent with the age of the cabin, using mortise and tenon joints.

Meanwhile, Addyson Fritz, 4, of Mendon, got her face painted while attending the fall event with her babysitter Crystal Smith.

“It’s something for the kids to do,” Smith said of the event. “We always try to find something fun for them to do when we have them.”

Sturgis High School teacher Carie Arseneau and student volunteers made the face painting possible. There was also pumpkin painting in which siblings Emmett Webster and Jaxson Summey participated. Mom Lacey Sturgeon said she saw the event on Facebook and wanted to come participate in some fun fall activities.

Dave Ludders said Camp Fort Hill merchandise was being sold at the event as well. Those funds and other donations were going to scholarships for kids’ camp, he said.

— Contact reporter Michelle Patrick at mpatrick@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Sturgis Journal: Big turnout at Camp Fort Hill Fall Event