A Wet Day in Fort Valley

Yesterday I drove through the rain to the Fall Craft Fair in Fort Valley. It was held at the old Trinity Church and Fort Valley Museum.

Inspired Sunday

Shenandoah Stories tells us that the church originally "followed the German Baptist Brethren Doctrine, which is often referred to as the Dunkards." This building dates to 1904, at which time it had over 200 members. But over the next hundred years, membership declined to fewer than 20 and the church closed in 2008. 

The craft fair was mostly held outdoors under shelters, but these men were demonstrating an old technology out in the open. I didn't watch for long because my shoes were wet and I wanted to warm up in the car, but the man who was kneeling appeared to be putting stalks (corn?) through a horse-powered machine that stripped them. 

There are a number of Mennonite families in Fort Valley and I have purchased crafts from them at previous events.  Here we see a woman and child as they crossed a small bridge. I filtered the picture in Painter Essentials to give it an impressionist look while anonymizing the faces. 

The road that took me there goes through a section of George Washington National Forest and it is beautiful even in the rain. Many leaves have changed to autumn colors although we have not yet had a hard frost. 

The road winds along next to Passage Creek in a narrow section of the valley with mountains rising steeply on both sides.