(La Porte County, IN) - She makes the three-hour drive here every year to see family members and go to the La Porte County Fair.

 

Jamie Schenkel, who grew up in La Porte, particularly enjoys Pioneer Land, the 1800’s style village she used to visit on school tours when she was a student at Crichfield Elementary School.

 

Schenkel, 32, now lives outside Indianapolis, Indiana, where she moved in 2014. 

 

The distance hasn’t stopped her from coming back home to visit family and pass down her love of Pioneer Land to her children during the fair every year. 

 

She took pictures of her children, Harper, 4, and Brody, 2, while they were sitting in the huge rocking chair big enough for a giant, perhaps, during the fair on Monday.

 

Schenkel said she likes to watch the blacksmiths heating and shaping metal into nails and other products.

 

Schenkel said she also very much enjoys talking to the people dressed as pioneers, getting a glimpse of what life was like back then, and taking her children for a glass of milk served at 25 cents a cup at the Farm Bureau Milk Cabin.

 

They also like seeing the animals in the petting zoo.

 

“It’s just a good family-friendly place to come, and it’s something fun to do at the fair,” Schenkel said.

Lead blacksmith Merle Miller has kept busy informing groups of children about the process of heating and shaping metal into nails, hooks, and other products used by the early settlers of the country.

 

“We have to have a fire to heat the metal, and then we hammer it on one side with a hammer and the other side with an anvil,” Miller said.

Pioneer Land is open again to the public during the fair, which runs through Saturday night.