Experience Frontier Life at the Mountain Man
Festival at Central Missouri’s Lake of the Ozarks

LAKE OF THE OZARKS, MO.– What was life like on the American frontier in the early 1800s? How did mountain men and Indians survive?  Discover the answers to these and other questions about frontier living at the 19th annual Osage River Mountain Man Festival and Rendezvous . The event is set for Sept. 15-17 at the American Legion Campground below Bagnell Dam at Central Missouri's Lake of the Ozarks.
   
“The goal of the Mountain Man Rendezvous is to provide an authentic living-history reenactment that captures the frontier era prior to the 1840s,” says Trisha Roberts, executive director of the Lake Area Chamber of Commerce.  “It's a wonderful opportunity to experience the past by walking among mountain men and women as they bring the 19th century back to life.”
   
Traders and trappers, gunsmiths and blacksmiths, artisans and storytellers will be on hand to recreate a frontier encampment in the days after the Lewis and Clark Expedition opened the West.  Participants' attire, equipment and lodging will faithfully depict a typical encampment, and the reenactors themselves will describe their lives to curious visitors.
   
Festival highlights will include demonstrations of frontier skills, and twice daily, visitors will cover their ears when World Anvil Shooting Champion Gay Wilkinson of Farmington, Mo., conducts the ever-popular anvil shoot.
   
How do you shoot an anvil?  Don't try this at home – but the experts place a large blacksmith's anvil upside down on the ground, fill it with gunpowder, place another anvil on top and light a line leading from the powder.  The deafening boom supposedly can be heard up to 15 miles away. “Towns without cannons shot anvils as an early warning system to alert residents to an emergency or a gathering,” explains festival co-chair Geniece Tyler.  “Gay shoots his anvil so high you wouldn't believe that big hunk of lead could soar like it does, more than 100 feet into the air.”
   
The French Colonial Artillery will be back to conduct reenactments with drills and cannon-firing throughout Saturday and Sunday.  “The Mountain Man Rendezvous is not just buckskin,” Tyler says.  “The French, English and Spanish all were in the region at one time or another in the early 19th century and all of these influences will be evident in re-enactors' costumes.”
   
Mountain men and women will compete for prizes in black powder shoots, tomahawk and knife throwing and fire-starting contests. The popular Trader's Row shopping area will feature collectible guns and knives, woven blankets, unique handicrafts, folk art and artifacts from the past. Concessions will offer homemade root beer, chili and barbecue.
   
Several thousand people attend the annual event, Tyler says.  “We have a lot of repeat visitors who bring their children every year because it's such a fantastic educational experience.  Where else can you see an actual teepee, how it's put together and how whole families lived inside them?” she says.
   
Admission for the entire weekend will be $5 for adults; children age 12 and younger will be admitted free with a paid adult admission.  The event will be open to the public from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. on Friday and Saturday, and 9:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. on Sunday.  On Friday students from area schools will be admitted free of charge to learn about 19th century frontier life.
   
“We invite everyone to come spend a fascinating few hours at the Osage River Mountain Man Festival,” Roberts says.  For more information contact the Lake Area Chamber of Commerce at 800-451-4117 or visit www.lakeareachamber.com. And to find out more about lodging, shopping, dining, attractions and activities at Central Missouri's Lake of the Ozarks, contact the Lake of the Ozarks Convention & Visitor Bureau at 800-FUN-LAKE or visit www.funlake.com.

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