This program is made possibl in part by funding from the Ohio Humanities Council and the National Endowment for the Humanities and by the members of WBGO TV.

Every autumn on the banks of the Maumee River in northwest Ohio, the villagers of Grand Rapids celebrate something important themselves and their heritage.

How?

By serving up kettles of apple butter, a thick, sweet paste of boiled down apples and cider The Apple Butter Festival has been an annual autumn Grand Rapids tradition since 1976, bringing thousands of people to this small Midwestern town, along with demonstrations of apple butter stirring.

The festival includes food, local, Midwestern as well as standard festive fare.

Historical reenactments and demonstrations.

Performances by Northwest Ohio musicians, children's entertainment crafts and other celebratory activities.

But this festival is more than an entertaining way to spend a Sunday afternoon in October.

It's also more than just a village fundraiser.

The event grew out of a sense of community and a proud historical identity tapping into local, regional and family traditions.

Festivals such as these are scattered throughout the U.S.. No, I don't think food festivals are unique to the Midwest, although the Midwest certainly puts a stamp on them that's peculiarly Midwestern.

We find them in every region of the country.

I think they've been expanding rapidly over the last dozen years or so perhaps even longer than that.

Yes, there are more of them.

There are way for Americans to celebrate a local identity as well as a national one.

The attempts to strengthen that heritage that maybe has already been created, a building on something that they believe in, for example, apple butter as central to northwest Ohio.

You bring the festival and you exploit the apple butter as heritage.

Today, the Grand Rapids Apple Butter Festival fosters a strong sense of past and place, strengthening and creating the ties of cooperation and responsibility that make up community.

In Stirring Up Apple Butter.

The festival also stirs up history, raising questions of which aspects of the past to celebrate and how best to display them.

[upbeat music] Grand Rapids was founded in 1833 by German, English and Scottish settlers.

In the mid 1800s, the Miami Erie Canal helped turn the village into a busy commercial center surrounded by family farms.

Over the next few decades, the Grand Rapids economy declined by the mid 1900s.

Grand Rapids was known mostly for recreational fishing in the early 1970s, a local businessman spurred the town's economy back into action, and civic pride blossomed.

The Grand Rapids Historical Society was established in 1975 Its ongoing interest in preserving local landmarks was well received by the town leaders who were concerned with its public image.

Its members suggested selling apple butter as a community fundraiser.

The very first festival in was started.

We weren't we made some apple butter out here at the farm and it's kind of a normal fall thing because we were in at the time, we sold produce and so forth.

And my wife managed the country store in Grand Rapids at the time.

And the Monday after we made it, she was talking with Marilyn Stevens on the street as they happened to do and had said, boy, you know, it'd be great fun for the society to put together a bay in the park where you can show people how you make apple butter and do all those and it all.

Well, that sounds like fun.

The Grand Rapids Apple Butter Festival was well on its way to becoming an established tradition.

[fire popping] Apple butter is a fixed spread made from boiling down chopped apples and apple cider.

Like many families in the Midwest, the Kryders of Henry County in Ohio have prepared apple butter throughout their family history My family used to do it before it became this society, like we did it at my grandma's house before I was born.

So it was a big family tradition type thing.

The recipe we use is the one that my grandfather would have used in 100 years ago, in effect.

We didn't have a recipe.

We just did it.

Well, if I can get a little cider on it, and again it was boiled down by we added the apple and then we'd boil it some more And then if it was thick enough, we put out sugar and a candle.

Well, it's a three day job.

In the old days, when the farm families would gather together on a farm they'd have a small kettle, maybe a 35 gallon one, which would be like the one that's that is my mom's over there under the tent, and there'd be a day to boil down cider.

You'd boil a kettle full of cider down to maybe a third to half of what it was.

And you set that aside and use it as the the liqueur to start the apple butter and then another day to peel apples So with a kettle this size, which is 50 gallon, you have to feel like 15 bushel of apples and cut them up.

And it takes an all day project to get that done.

And then the third day would be like, we're doing here You put it on early, we get to get the liquor cookin and then gradually over a six or seven hour period, add some apples to it and you got to stir constantly, that whole time.

And I'm putting the corn husks on the stirers And what they do is they scrape the bottom so the kettle doesn't burn.

[fire popping] If sugar is used, it's added towards the end of the cooking.

75lbs to a 50 gallon kettle.

The apple butter is done when it reaches a certain thickness.

They would test it by tip on a plate like that.

And you can see there's a little bit of water that develops along the edge and they would say it's still weeping.

So they would say, okay, you've got to cook it another half hour or another hour.

But we found that it becomes too strong tasting for today's palates, I guess.

So we use we cook it a little less than that.

One 50 gallon kettle fills 300 one pint jars.

Kettles can be heirlooms that are passed down to each generation.

Recipes vary according to family and regional tastes.

So it's kind of interesting because everybody's got their own little recipe in their own little way of doing things.

It depends on where they come from.

I think that they have these different recipes.

So traditionally in Pennsylvania, where apple butter was first introduced by German settlers, fennel seed, nutmeg and cloves were common additions.

The southern states preferred cinnamon.

Typical of the Midwest, Steve doesn't add spices, although some families stir in red hot candies.

Originally, sugar was not used, making apple butter and inexpensive and practical pioneer food.

Some families today leave it out for health reasons or to cut costs.

Outdoor cooking gives the apple butter a distinctive flavor.

Oh that unique flavor that only an outside kettl can make for the apple butter.

We had apple butter, but you always go to the stock.

Nothing like that.

I think people have a treat when they buy this, you know, because it just.

I think it's just has a different flavor.

Smoky flavor maybe, but a different flavor.

historically, apple butter was spread on bread, often replacing butter or jelly.

And see, we have it spread that way on our bread.

And it really it was an easy way to keep it.

Many people today still prefer it that way.

Or you put on the bread and then you put it in a microwave or whatever.

So I just like it more.

It's just have a richer flavor.

Just on bread, just toasted bread.

Cornbread.

It's really good on cornbread.

I like to eat it on crackers Some folks use it as a cooking ingredient, as a glaze on roasted meats, in barbecue sauce and in muffins.

French toast cakes and cookies.

[old-timey music] For the Kryder family, apple butter has always been a practical tradition.

It was a way of preserving the apple harvest and a source of revenue for their roadside stand.

But it also carries many fond memories and is a way to maintain family identity.

People are trying to keep family traditions Most families have discontinued the tradition of making apple butter over an open fire.

However, the food still evokes the cooperation, hard work and individual initiative that sustained farm families in earlier times.

Nowadays, there are pockets of industry and nearby urban centers, but much of this region remains heavily agricultural.

So the qualities that define the essential character of the Midwest live on.

Apple orchards and stories of Johnny Appleseed are common here, as are the foods and products made from apples, pie, sauce, cider and, of course, butter.

Well, they dried apples and they canned apples, made apple sauce And then they buried them for the winter.

For many, an apple butter is old fashioned, plain, practical and wholesome.

When the festival planners drew upon these associations with apple butter, they neatly connected the town of Grand Rapids with a much larger heritage, that of the rural Midwest and early pioneer America.

We've got apple butter because that becomes sort of a symbol of the region in both of our folklore and legend and mythology and in history as fact.

The organizers tapped into other connections as well.

The fall season, the harvest, Halloween and Thanksgiving, and even holiday gift buying.

The festival also celebrates the close connection between farmers and nature.

Farmers had their chores regardless of the weather.

Similarly, the festival goes on no matter what Mother Nature brings, even with the cool weather which was here today adds to the atmosphere of the Apple Butter Festival big time.

Because it's a little bit of a sure Feeling that fall is in the air adds to the mystique of the whole thing.

Also associated with apple buter at the festival is patriotism.

Images of apples and celebrating.

America as a nation are scattered through the festival.

Apple butter also commemorates the German heritage of northwes Ohio since it was originally a Pennsylvania Dutch food.

Bratwurst, also sold by the Historical Society, emphasizes this heritage for many festival goers.

Apple butter now primarily calls to mind the picturesque village of Grand Rapids and the hustle and bustle the festival brings.

[string music] People come to the festival for a variety of reasons.

The food festivals have a myriad of functions.

They pull communities together.

They help a community establish its identity and explain why it's different from its neighbors.

Economically, that can be extremely important for certain regions and communities.

The prime reason for the Grand Rapids Festival is apple butter This is why you come to the Grand Rapids Festival, apple butter It has to come from where they're making it.

Visitors can see demonstrations of how it's made and even try their hand at stirring the butter.

The Historical Society sells souvenir jars of the spread.

I usually get about eight or ten jars and that lasts the year.

We get enough to last all year.

You know, when I bring it home, people say, Well, why didn't you bring me some?

I actually tried to but I ate it before you got it Not everyone comes for the apple butter or likes the taste of it, but the festival offers a little of everything.

Many people come for the historical aspects demonstrations of old fashioned crafts and living history displays and presentations.

But I enjoyed the living encampent I like the history, the frontiers, crafts, and to be able to show her how things were done in 150, 200 years ago.

I think that's really unique about this festival.

Arts and crafts sales are also a big draw.

Others come for the food, the entertainment, and simply the fun of a festive family outing.

Bean soup, open kettle, bean soup.

And the whole hog sandwiches or the buffalo burgers.

Very good.

It just a fun down home.

Festival.

Very nice.

It's a great little festival we see about any kind of craft, any kind of, you know, people, entertainment, but just the place to be.

For many, attending the festival has become an annual tradition that they would not miss.

My wife and I try to go every year.

We enjoy the atmosphere, the food and the company, and there's there's tons of people.

It's just a lot of fun to go every year.

For the organizers and volunteers, the festival has come to mean much more than a one day fundraiser.

It's grown out of the Grand Rapids community and contributes to a feeling of belonging.

And it's very often it's pretty much the same crew of people from year to year.

And that's and that's also one of the things that I really like about the festival and particularly on the day of because there are people that you see once a year, it's just a good feel that everybody participated.

It's like a big family.

I mean, obviously we aren't all family, but the town of Grand Rapids has been with this apple butter It's just a big family of people willing to work.

All the kids, all ages.

Some will say.

What are you doing for apple butter?

You know?

And then they'll tell you what they're doing.

And they're very proud of helping.

And I'm picking up trash and doing this and doing that.

You know, it's neat, right?

So I think I have an awful lot of ways in which these festival become a part of a community and help it determine its own identity and keep recreating it year after year.

A volunteer festival director oversees committees and numerous volunteers that work behind the scenes.

preparing the apple butter alone takes many people.

Bushels of apples are peeled and chopped on four different days.

Before we used to do it by hand.

That was a lot of work.

You know, you have to slice them up and this is a lot of time saver because.

Used to do it all day Thursday and all day Friday.

And now they do it Wednesday night and Thursday.

Done by 1-2:00 in the afternoon So that's a lot of time.

Many participants have been doing this for years.

Others are newcomers.

And again, that's part of that community involvement we got.

Originally, we got senior citizens to do it.

Now it's kind of expanded to a variety of people.

I announced it Sunday in church and I said, bring your pans and your knives it's apple butter time The pealing is a festivity in itself.

They gave us our lunch We always have pizza The chopped apples are taken to the Kryder's farm and save for the big stirring held several weekends before the festival.

This stirring offers a chance to visit and has become a tradition of its own.

I think the thing that I always enjoy about it is because it is a slow paced operation, something that takes just hours I think it really forces people to sort of just slow down and take their time.

I always find that people will stand over the kettle.

Reminiscing and talking about the things, maybe since they haven't seen that person, you know, they've always come out here to the farm ever since they started.

So this is like 25 years of or 24 years now that they've come out here to do this.

And it hasn't changed much.

On the day of the festival, volunteers again stoke up the fires in the early morning for the demonstration kettles.

This apple butter is also canned and sold as Historical Society members recount tales of Grand Rapids.

That was one of our one of our requirements, per se.

If you wanted to be involved, you should wear a costume.

Even the more mundane aspects of the festival, setting up, directing traffic and cleaning up can create feelings of community.

But, you know, it's always a lot of work, but it also is one of those things where it's just a you know, there's a lot of interesting people and and everybody kind of, you know, like today will have food and a good time.

For many volunteers, participating in the festival is a family tradition.

My family is from Grand Rapids and now I live in Toledo.

And my husband, I've been coming out over the last couple of years to help out.

And the day of the festival, my parents have been involved from the very beginning helping Marilyn Stephenson.

My dad's here today and I have family in the area, and we used to come here years ago.

I originally lived in Maumee Ohio, on Jerome Road We've been living down in Florida for ten years, and I was anxious to come back to come to the festival.

This is what fall's about it.

We want to come back each year and it's almost like a homecoming almost every year.

And it's a lot of fun.

And they'll be out here later today and they'll bring their kids out.

The grandchildren will be here.

And so, you know, we we enjoy doing it as a family activity for the day.

I look forward to it.

It means everything to me.

And what's so interesting is that so many of us here now, we raise our children at the festival.

You know, all the kids were involved when we made apple butter out of the Kryder farm lots of familiar faces each yea everyone comes back every year.

And I've always thoroughly enjoyed the fact that maybe I don't see some of the people in the village, but once a year and this is it, and we all visit and we get a chance to see each other and catch up on kids.

And it's neat.

For many of these volunteers, the festival represents a few intense days of service to their town service.

That leaves them feeling connected to a place and a past and to other people.

I can come out here.

And I feel like it's sort of carrying on a tradition of.

That started a long time ago.

Over the years, the festival has brought money into the town for local nonprofit organizations the community benefits group, the Otsego schools, all their youth groups, sports groups, cheerleaders, everybody, music boosters, athlete boosters.

So they all benefit from having this event, which is a big one.

Money from the Historical Society has sponsored building renovations and educational projects throughout the village.

In essence, the festival has transformed Grand Rapids into a more pleasant place to live, as well as a tourist destination.

I think it's changed the town in terms of our level of pride.

I think everyone involved, all the local groups that are involved from every age are just really proud of this and we pull it off.

Back in the fifties, when I was a small child.

Grand Rapids wasn't as beautiful as today and wasn't the nice place to come visit on a fall date for the apple butter fest.

The growth of the festival since 1976 has been phenomenal from a handful of visitors to crowds of over 60,000.

There always have been, you know, over the course of 24 years, anytime you do something, you're going to have issues that evolve and concerns about how things work and what you do with this.

Growth has come logistical problems, parking, crowd control, providing adequate facilities and space for the festival goers and accommodating professional vendors.

Disputes have erupted.

For instance, residents are allotted parking passes on the day of the festival.

However, some took more than their fair share and turned their homes into parking lots.

Others rented their yards and driveways to the outside professional food vendors.

This put the money into the pockets of individuals instead of the community.

Some festival volunteers felt their hard work was no longer profiting the community and some residents felt they were losing control of their own town, and others felt that the dispute marred the beauty of the village and the spirit of cooperation that marked the event.

As a result, the community has begun rethinking the purpose of the festival.

Has it outgrown the Historical Society's original vision?

Most of the organizers want to emphasize the educational aspects, and that's the whole point of festival, is to be an educational day for people and what they're hoping to do to show.

Things of the past and how they influence our lives today.

Make it a fun day for everybody to come and partake in a lot of different activities.

The society's goal has always been to provide on a one day circumstance where you can see all of the Pioneer Crafts and all of the demonstrators and the historic re-enactors and all of the things that historically make for, of importance from the Grand Rapids area.

It was the main purpose of staring this to begin with for the community because like I say, we consolidate with Otsego So there is a little few, hard feelings I guess I am.

Our thoughts on the outside vendors that are coming in is that we've worked so very hard that this festival not become a carnival yet, that there's nothing wrong with them per say or five k run or parades or anything like that.

It's just not what we want for this festival because we want to get the people who come here an authentic look at our village and an authentic look at history.

[old-timey music] Like any celebration of heritage, these disputes point to deeper issues of how residents think of their town and their past.

Ultimately, whose town is it and whose heritage is being celebrated?

Heritage is complicated and involves different attitudes toward the past.

Heritage is when a group of people or a region, a regional group, reaches back into the past and picks out bits and pieces of its histor and recreates and reassembles it so that it means something to them .

And in the present it becomes meaningful.

Some people want to preserve the past.

Some would rather push it in a pile.

Folk select different events from the past and interpret them to fit their own perspective.

These interpretations can give conflicting views of ourselves and of our past.

Other people might be against the particular slant on heritag because they would like to pick and choose a different part of the past to emphasize.

One can argue that the Grand Rapids Apple Butter Festival highlights the town's family farming heritage.

In doing so, it creates a reinterpreted identity for the community.

Apple butter carries values of wholesomeness, family togetherness and community spirit.

It suggests the pioneer qualities of simplicity, honesty and self-sufficiency.

These meanings come to life in the festival, intertwining apple butter and Grand Rapids.

The characteristics of apple butter and of the pioneers who made it are transferred to the village itself.

The sentiments linger long after the end of the one day event.

Through this festival, a simple jar of apple butter not only offers a taste of the past, but also stirs up varying images of who we were and what we have become.

And like heritage.

Both add flavor, texture and sustenance to our lives.

[old-timey music] This program is made possible in part by funding from the Ohio Humanities Council and the National Endowment for the Humanities and by the members of WBGU TV.