The Rural Education Center at the Farmers Market is a hands-on agricultural education center. Tours of the center are held March thru May, and September thru November. The charge for a tour is $3 per child, and each tour takes approximately three hours.
The Rural Heritage Center was founded in 2002 to help educate young children about early farm life. During the tour, children learn about fruits and vegetables from a miniature farm stand. They see and learn about old farm tools such as cross cut saws, hand drills and more. They also identify crops farmers grow and how these same crops are changed into some of the food we can eat, such as corn into cornmeal and wheat into flour.
Butter is made in an old “daisy” butter churn, water is pumped from a hand pump and clothes are washed using a wash board and hung on the line to dry. Children learn to milk a (fiberglass) cow, which produces real milk, and pick eggs from a hen’s nest. There are pigs to feed, soybeans to plant and plenty to see at the Virginia Beach Farmers Market Rural Heritage Center.
For more information, call (757) 385-4395. Learn more about the Virginia Beach Farmers Market by visiting www.VBgov.com/farmersmarket.