Take a trip back to a time more than a century ago at the Conestoga Area Historical Society's Fall Harvest Festival.

The annual event will be held Saturday, Sept. 27, from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Sunday, Sept. 28, from noon to 4 p.m. at the Conestoga Area Historical Society, 51 Kendig Road, Conestoga.

There is no charge for admission; donations will be accepted. The event will be canceled if there is severe weather. Go to http://www.pennmanorhistory.org for more information.

There will be demonstrations in tinsmithing, pottery making, woodworking, weaving, cobbling, spinning and drying, blacksmithing, rifle making, rug making, flintknapping, basket weaving, hat making, and tape loom weaving.

"The craftspeople are the highlight," said Conestoga Area Historical Society vice president Jim Kauffman. "They show how they do their crafts, and we let them sell things if they want to sell their crafts."

There will be activities for children, including face painting. Cherry Hill Orchards donates pumpkins for kids to paint. "We have a couple ladies that guide them through their painting their pumpkins, and then they can take it home," said Kauffman. "And there's a rope maker that comes and lets kids help make ropes."

A volunteer will make cookies for sale in an old-time beehive bake oven. There will also be slices of homemade pie for sale.

Nanalyn's Catering will sell brisket sandwiches, barbecue sandwiches, hot dogs, hamburgers and drinks.

The historical society has Conestoga wagons and recently received a donation of a Jenny Lyn carriage. The organization also has a farm wagon it is making into a prairie schooner. "A lot of people come here and they say, 'Oh, we've seen pictures of Conestoga wagons out in the west and on the prairies,'" Kauffman said. "The Conestoga wagons didn't go probably beyond the Mississippi (River) because they were too big, and it took too many animals to pull them. They had a prairie schooner. We have a smaller-type farm wagon, and we have the bows we're going to put the top on so we can show people the difference between a prairie schooner and other kinds of wagons."

Visitors will also have the chance to visit a broom maker's shop, a tannery building with an exhibit of local furs, a big display of stuffed animals from the area, and a decoy museum.

The Conestoga Area Historical Society is dedicated to preserving the history of Conestoga, Manor, Martic, and Pequea townships, and Millersville Borough.

The museum will be open every Saturday and Sunday from 1 to 4 p.m. through Sunday, Dec. 14. Volunteers are present to guide visitors around the premises.

Kauffman noted that there are 250 members of the organization, which offers life memberships, annual memberships, and family memberships. Members receive a quarterly newsletter.

"We're trying to promote the history of the Penn Manor School District," said Kauffman. "It was originally started as just a kind of Conestoga historical society, and then later, they wanted to broaden it out a little bit. Basically, it's a Penn Manor area historic society. We just want people to come and see their heritage and see what it was like 100 years ago, 200 years ago."

It will all be on display during the Fall Harvest Festival. "It's just always a lot of things going on," said Kauffman. "There's always a lot of interest and a lot of people. It's amazing how many people show up and say, 'I didn't know this place was here.'"