METROPOLIS – The popular Fort Massac Encampment, which has drawn thousands of visitors to southern Illinois every fall for 50 years, will return to Fort Massac State Park in Metropolis this Saturday and Sunday.
Since 1974, the encampment festival has provided visitors with a chance to experience what life was like at Fort Massac during the 18th and early 19th centuries. The fort served as a frontier outpost along the Ohio River for personnel from France, Britain, and the early years of the United States from 1757 to 1814.
Event times are 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Sunday. The Fort Massac Encampment is hosted by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources and sponsored by the Greater Metropolis Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Hundreds of military reenactors and other participants wearing period clothing will present the roles of explorers, traders, settlers, and soldiers on the early Illinois frontier. The encampment features an opening “Posting of the Colours” ceremony at 10 a.m. Saturday and Sunday. Both afternoons, mock military battles and tactical demonstrations will be performed by reenactors on the Fort Massac grounds beginning at 3 p.m. A military retreat ceremony will close the event at 5 p.m. Saturday and at 4:30 p.m. Sunday.
Family and children’s activities, musical entertainment, and period craft makers demonstrating blacksmithing, basket-making, weaving, and other skills will be staged throughout the encampment grounds.
Food and drink from dozens of vendors will be available for purchase. Options include such popular items as burgoo, barbecue, chili, stew, chicken and dumplings, ham and beans, apple crisp, sausage and kraut, burgers, homemade root beer and lots more.
Admission is free. Parking is available at the Old Fairgrounds adjacent to the park. Trams will be available. Fort Massac State Park is closed to public vehicle traffic during festival hours.
Fort Massac State Park, which opened as Illinois’ first state park in 1908, is located on the Ohio River at 1308 E. Fifth St. in Metropolis. For more information about the encampment and the park, contact the site office at 618-524-4712.
