Pioneer Day at historic inn on Oct. 12.

    Traveler’s Rest State Historic Site will hold Pioneer Day on Saturday, Oct. 12, from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m.
    Visitors will learn the skills of the early settlers and hear the stories of times past from living historians.
    There will be Appalachian music, an apothecary shop, corn shelling, corn husk dolls, quilting, spinning, blacksmithing, leater working and black powder demonstrations.
    Visitors can also lern about the native American presence on the Tugaloo River and climb aboard the covered wagon and the Jarrett family buggy.
    Activities are free. Tours of the inn are available at a cost of $3 to 45.
    Traveler’s Rest State Historic Site, standing on a crossroads of history near the intersection of the Old King’s Highway and Unicoi Turnpike, showcases Georgia’s last stagecoach inn, long-time residence of the Jarrett family, that displays craftsmanship, provides wayfarers glances into early American travel, and peers back into life in 19th century Georgia.
    This stagecoach inn and plantation home was built around 1815 by James R. Wyly. He strategically located it along the newly constructed Unicoi Turnpike, a busy highway over the Appalachian Mountains.
    Wyly operated the inn until 1833 when he sold it to his neighbor Devereaux Jarrett, the "richest man in the Tugaloo Valley."
    Jarrett continued to operate the inn, but doubled its size to make it the home place of his 14,400 acre plantation along the Tugaloo River.     
    Three generations of Jarretts inhabited the site until the state of Georgia purchased the remaining few acres of the once-vast plantation for $8,000 in 1955.
    Thanks to both its architectural significance and its role in the early history of the area, Traveler's Rest was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1964.
    Today, visitors can tour the house and see many original artifacts and furnishings, some of which were crafted by Caleb Shaw, a renowned cabinetmaker from Massachusetts.
    Traveler’s Rest is located on Riverdale Road, just off Highway 123 North near the South Carolina state line.