Come to the festival
Three days of tours, reenactments, craft demonstrations, music, Vintage Base Ball, and children's activities, every August.
Festival detailsWalk into Montcalm County, circa 1900.
Twenty-eight buildings, moved here from towns and farms across the county: a log cabin, a one-room school, a depot, a jail, a steam locomotive. Volunteers keep every one of them standing.
A county's history, moved one building at a time
Montcalm Heritage Village began in 1987 during Michigan's sesquicentennial, with a log cabin and a country school. Today it spans 28 buildings on the Sidney campus of Montcalm Community College, with hundreds of artifacts showing how people here lived at the turn of the 20th century.
Most of the buildings are originals, carefully numbered, taken apart, and put back together here. Others are faithful replicas built by volunteers. All of them are open to the public with a docent at the festival, and to school groups and tour groups by arrangement.
Ways to be part of it
Bring a class or a group
School groups and Scouts tour for free. Other small groups pay a flat rate, and the pavilion is included.
Tour informationHold your wedding or reunion here
Say your vows in the Village Church, or gather under the pavilion among the historic buildings.
Rental ratesHelp keep it standing
Buy an engraved brick for the church walkway, donate, or join the volunteers who meet monthly.
Support the villageMeet a few of the buildings
Steam Switch Engine #7456
Built in 1920, 174,000 pounds, last run in 1950. It sits on the grounds beside the depot, caboose, and water tower.
The Gaffield School
A one-room school from 1904 where a single teacher taught every grade through eighth, with a wood or coal stove in the middle.
The Edmore Jail
Where lumbering-era Edmore sent its rowdiest drinkers to sober up, until they went back to the saloons.