by Savannah Lore

Every third Saturday, The Alexander Majors House Barn houses a little childhood fun. We have partnered with the Kansas City Public Library WestPort Branch, to give a free Saturday Story Time for children ages 3 to 8. I really love working this event because the children have a lot of fun with the story time and the activities that we do, but the parents/guardians are also interested in the house and history. We work to make sure that the activities on our end are fun, informative and deal with history.

The last Story Time (July 18) was around the theme of gardening. We brought in herbs from the Wornall House’s herb garden, and I discussed with the kids what people would use them for in the 19th century. We even had some mythical uses or ideas of what the different herbs did. Did you know that basil was thought to prevent lightening strikes? The kids and even the parents liked these little fun facts. I tried to uses these myths to drawn the children attention so I could talk about the real uses for herbs and how they acted like medicines for different conditions or illnesses in this period.

I have learned more about talking and interacting with many different groups of people at the same time. I also learned about working with different institutions. It was a lot of work to set up these events, and one family actually came back to take a tour of the house. So, I call that a successful program.