PETERSBURG — Rain clouds failed to dampen the spirits of the crowds that gathered at Penn State’s Shaver’s Creek Environmental Center to celebrate the 40th anniversary of the Maple Harvest Festival on Saturday, March 23, and Sunday, March 24.
The Maple Harvest Festival made its debut at Shaver’s Creek in 1984, starting off as a small group of maple syrup enthusiasts. At the 40th annual festival, more than 225 people were tasked with organizing the sold-out event, which drew around 1,600 guests.
The two-day festival invited its participants to learn about the tradition of maple sugaring as carried out in colonial times and the present day, identifying maple trees and how to collect sap. The event also included live music, a climbing wall and all-you-can-eat pancakes with real maple syrup.
“Maple sugaring has been a part of Shaver’s Creek for a while. It’s always been something that is intriguing to people,” Laurie McLaughlin, a primary coordinator for the festival and a program director and instructor at Shaver’s Creek, explained. “A collection of sugar maple trees is called a sugar bush, so we head out into the sugar bush to collect sap and boil it down into syrup. It’s just a really unique process and helps people understand where their food comes from — how it comes from a plant and how that’s part of their space and their environment.”
Shaver’s Creek itself has been around since 1976. Open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. every day, the nature center offers educational and recreational activity opportunities, trails, conservation education and much more to the community.
Community volunteers, education interns and Penn State students play a pivotal role in the success of the Maple Harvest Festival each year, helping out with everything from preparing food and guiding visitors to running educational stations and explaining demonstrations.
“It was really successful in terms of our community and staff coming together and pulling off the event. It doesn’t happen with just one person or even a few people. It’s such a collaborative effort. Our staff and the students put in so much work, the environmental education interns put in so much work and many of the volunteers that return to help at the festival are past staff and students,” McLaughlin noted. “So that speaks to their connection to this place, what they feel they’ve been given and learned over time and how they can continue to give back to a place that they love.”
Although the Maple Harvest Festival’s 40th celebration is over, there’s still time for members of the community to learn about the long tradition of maple sugaring. The crew at Shaver’s Creek created a timeline for guests to view that features historical documents, newspaper clippings, photos, stories and more dating back to the festival’s inception in 1984 at the nature center.
Reflecting on not only this year’s festival but each iteration of the event since she took over organizing in 1994, McLaughlin emphasized a sense of community and shared joy the Maple Harvest Festival brings to its participants.
“We have families who come back every year with their kids to enjoy this festival, and I’m just so fulfilled with gratitude for the people that I work with and the community that comes together to work on putting this event together. It brings me a lot of joy to wander around and see people engaging with each other, reunions happening and people who haven’t seen each other in a long time. It’s a really special community event,” McLaughlin said.
As the rain subsided and the last batch of maple syrup was savored, the 40th Maple Harvest Festival concluded, leaving its guests with fond memories of community as well as an appreciation for the art of maple sugaring, history and nature.
