Rural Heritage Celebration at Clemson Pee Dee REC

Celebrate rural heritage and 100 years of Clemson University in the Pee Dee Clemson University’s Pee Dee Research and Education Center opens its doors from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. April 16 for the 2011 Rural Heritage Celebration at the center’s Outdoor Education Trail.

This year’s event is extra special because it marks the 100th anniversary of Clemson in the Pee Dee. There will be a series of events over the next 12 months, including the burial of a time capsule during a ceremony at the Rural Heritage Celebration.

The annual outdoor showcase, which is free and open to the public, features the best of South Carolina’s homegrown foods, exhibits on how the state’s rural heritage was shaped and displays on renewable green energy and how it will help power South Carolina’s future.

Visitors can learn about beekeeping and basket weaving, take a wagon ride and see a collection of antique tractors provided by Waccamaw Tractor and Engine Club.

Further, interactive learning centers located throughout the 1.5-mile-long trail will explain the importance of natural resources found in the ecosystems of the region. The trail offers information on how these resources are used and the role society has in resource conservation.

Attendees can follow the trail and learn about Clemson’s research projects as they move from longleaf pine restoration to bird house row, through the corn maze and into the butterfly garden, among many other areas.

For more information and to download a map of the trail, visit http://www.clemson.edu/oet (http://www.clemson.edu/media-relations/oet).

Clemson’s Pee Dee center is at 2200 Pocket Road in Florence, 1.5 miles off Interstate 95, exit 169.