UW-Green Bay Hosts Midwest’s Largest Viking Festival This Weekend
(Green Bay, WI) — On Friday and Saturday, October 4th and 5th, Vikings from near and far will gather and raise an encampment on the UW-Green Bay Viking House grounds (near Wood Hall) on the Green Bay campus. This will be UW-Green Bay’s third year hosting the Midwest’s largest Viking festival. The festival will be held from 10am to 4 pm. Admission is free and the event is open to the public.
Each year, more than sixty Vikings set up a large camp to demonstrate blacksmithing, silversmithing, wood carving and turning, textile arts, glass bead making, cooking, storytelling, singing and battle reenactments. This is an all-ages festival with activities for kids as well (a Viking Quest and kubb). This year’s festival will also host numerous new events, such as demonstrations from rune and flute making expert Kari Tauring. With even more events on the docket, and a higher projected attendance, the festival is expected to continue to grow.
The Midwest Viking Festival carries vital importance for the region. Thousands of people in the Upper Midwest have ancestry from Scandinavian countries, attributed to the large influx of Scandinavian immigrants in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
