Heritage Festival

The Community Services Clearinghouse hosts the first annual Heritage Festival, a multi-venued celebration promoting history, on April 4 in downtown Fort Smith. Events start at 10:00 a. m. and go until 6:00 p. m.

The first stop on the Heritage Trail is the Fort Smith Convention Center, where the Natchez Nation will perform a pow-wow from 10:00 a. m. – midnight. Children’s activities, music, vendors and food will be available in this area, too. Patrons will be charged a small fee for the pow-wow and other activities in the area.

The second stop on the trail will feature the Lawbreakers and Peacemakers performing on the lawn of the Sebastian County Courthouse at South 6th Street and Rogers Avenue. Barbecue will also be available for lunch.

Patrons, on the third stop on the Heritage Trail, will be treated to Fort Smith Museum of History presentations on Native American history during the Civil War.

The final stop is the Fort Smith National Historic Site, where a re-creation of the founding of the first Fort Smith at Belle Point will be performed. Living historians will interpret life at the frontier post and at the community that sprang up next to the fort.

The festival is a fundraiser for the “Meals for Kids” program operated by the Clearinghouse. All money raised by the agency is used to purchase food for the program, which currently feeds 2,400 children through area public schools. For more information, call 479-782-5074.