A corn maze in Lowell honors Indiana's Indiana’s rich archaeological history and the hulking prehistoric creatures that once roamed the Region.
Kregel's Pumpkin Patch at 7705 W. 159th Ave. in Lowell made “Digging Up Bones” the theme of its annual corn maze. An aerial view of the maze in a cornfield shows a woolly mammoth, a saber-tooth cat and other prehistoric creatures.
“Our mission statement is ‘to create opportunities for families to learn, laugh and play together by connecting them to agriculture and local history,’” owner Derrill Kregel said. “When I was a kid, Paul Patton, the father of one of the families in my 4-H club, dug up bones of a mammoth off of Arizona Street in Leroy. At the time I thought it was incredible that a beast this large roamed the land in Northwest Indiana.”
Kregel did research and discovered mammoth remains have been found in all of Indiana's 92 counties.
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“So I decided to go with an archaeology-themed maze,” Kregel said. “Richard Owen, Indiana’s first geologist, found remains of a sabertooth in a cave in southern Indiana near Bloomington. So my goal is to connect kids to our prehistoric past with this maze.”
Kregel’s maze features an interactive "digging up bones" game in which people find medallions on posts representing the prehistoric mammoth, sabertooth cat, bison, giant ground sloth, equus horse and the short-faced bear. Kids who find all six get a junior archeologist sticker.
This fall the corn maze will be open to the public through the end of October. Kregel’s Pumpkin Patch also will have a farm stand, pumpkins, hayrides a pumpkin peak slides, a barrel train ride, a pedal car ride and a petting zoo. It will sell hot apple cider, donuts and freshly popped kettle corn.
Visitors also can buy honey, hand-painted pumpkins, gourds, mums, corn stalks and straw bales.
“In the words of Grandpa Roger Kregel ‘take your time going and hurry back.’” Kregel said
Kregel's market will be open from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Saturday and from noon until 6 p.m. Sunday. The maze and attractions will be open from 10:30 a.m. to 6 p.m. Monday through Friday, from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and from noon until 6 p.m. Sunday.
For more information, call 219-690-1503, visit Kregel’s Pumpkin Patch on Facebook or go to www.kregelspumpkinpatch.com.
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