Mid-August is when Vermont's event calendar stops being polite and just piles everything on top of everything else. This weekend you've got a 135-year-old drum corps in Bennington, a free jazz festival taking over half of Stowe village, a museum in Brownington marking 190 years, and a hundred farmers market tents between them. Here's what's worth the drive.

Friday, August 14

Bennington kicks off Battle Day weekend — the town's annual commemoration of the 1777 battle that helped break Burgoyne's campaign, and this year it stretches from Thursday through Sunday. Friday belongs to the Bennington Fire Department at 130 River Street, which runs a Fireman's Lunch from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. (sausage with peppers and onions, burgers, dogs, fries), a chicken barbecue from 4 to 6 p.m. dine-in or takeout, Vegas Night from 6 to 9 p.m., and Big Truck Night across from the firehouse from 5 to 9 p.m. If you have a kid who likes climbing into an excavator, this is the evening. Details at the Town of Bennington.

A few blocks away, the Bennington Museum hosts Concerts in the Courtyard with SIRSY, 5 to 7 p.m., free. Bring your own chair; food and drink are on site. Info at the Bennington Museum.

Up in Lamoille County, the Stowe Jazz Festival opens its mainstage at 120 Weeks Hill Road at 1 p.m. and doesn't let up until 11. The whole thing is free — that's not a typo — with sets running through the afternoon and evening, including Duduka da Fonseca's trio with Maucha Adnet at 5 and Donny McCaslin and Ingrid Jensen's Civil Disobedience at 7. Then the festival scatters into the village: Brandon Terzakis Quartet at Field Guide Lodge 3 to 6 p.m., salsa with Alma Picante at Piecasso from 9, and a late jam at Doc Pond's with the Matthew Fries Quartet. Full schedule at the Stowe Jazz Festival.

In Randolph, the Central Vermont Chamber Music Festival brings cellist Erik Friedlander to Chandler Center for the Arts at 7 p.m. for Block Ice & Propane, his solo multimedia piece built around childhood cross-country road trips. Twenty dollars for adults, free for students — one of the better deals in Orange County.

Middlebury's Town Hall Theater opens the Young Company Classic production of Antigone at 7 p.m. Sophocles in a nineteenth-century Vermont opera house is a combination that mostly works.

Windsor County gets Music by the River with John Pinetree at East End Park in Woodstock, 5 to 8:30 p.m., and downtown Woodstock runs its Summer Sidewalk Sale 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. — details on both from Woodstock Area Chamber. Over in Weston, Weston Theater Company opens the final weekend of RENT at 7:30 p.m., part of the company's 90th anniversary season.

Up north, the Montshire Museum sets up a pop-up science fair at the Albany Town Hall from 3 to 6 p.m. — wind tunnel, fossils, hands-on stuff for families — and Catamount Arts in St. Johnsbury hosts Poetry From Life for teens at 7 p.m. The Albany listing comes via the Barton Chronicle's Kingdom Calendar, still the best single source for what's happening in Orleans County.

And in Chittenden County, the Richmond Farmers Market takes over Volunteers Green from 3 to 6:30 p.m., with live music on the green. Info at the NOFA-VT market directory.

Saturday, August 15

Battle Day proper. The Battle Day 5K starts at the Bennington Battle Monument at 8:30 a.m. (shirt pickup 7:30), followed by a Revolutionary War encampment on the monument grounds from 10 to 5 with re-enactors, cannon and musket demonstrations. At noon the Moodus Drum and Fife Corps plays a free open-air concert on the lawn — same drums and same style they used at the monument's dedication in 1891, which is the kind of continuity you don't get many places. Downtown, a Food Truck Festival runs 11 to 7, and the Sage City Symphony joins the Music Company Orchestra for an America 250 concert at the Vermont Veterans Home at 6 p.m. At 7:30, the Bennington Theater stages First Link in the Chain, a one-man comedy about the battle, for five dollars. Schedule at the Town of Bennington. The Bennington Museum also runs its Vermont Coppers Symposium — "The 14th Star: Currency & Independence" — from 10 to 3, on how a breakaway republic financed itself.

Rutland's big night is Carly Pearce at the Paramount Theatre, 7 p.m., with Sela Campbell opening. Tickets run $55 to $85 and the Paramount's 1914 room is a genuinely good place to hear a country singer. Earlier that afternoon, Killington's free Cooler in the Mountains series brings Bob Wagner to the K-1 base area, 3 to 5:45 p.m., with Kenny Mehler opening — Killington Resort has the lineup.

Bristol shuts down Main Street for Pocock Rocks, its free music festival and street fair, 2 to 7 p.m. Local musicians, makers, food and beverage producers, and no cover — listing via the Mad River Valley calendar.

In the Mad River Valley, the Waitsfield Farmers' Market runs 9 to 1 on the Mad River Green with live music, and at 2 p.m. the Stark Mountain Foundation leads a free naturalist hike from the Mad River Glen basebox with Vermont Master Naturalist Gene Desideraggio — up the Snowshoe Trail, down the 19th Hole, about two hours, ages 5 and up, pre-registration required. Both at Mad River Valley. That evening at 8, Phantom Theater presents BDB Dance in the Edgcomb Barn in Warren — Phantom Theater has been doing barn performances up that dirt road for decades and it remains one of the more unlikely good things in Vermont.

Montpelier's Capital City Farmers Market is on State Street 9 to 1, and the Kellogg-Hubbard Library throws its End of Summer Reading Party 10:15 to 12:30 with a live VINS raptor program at 11.

The Northeast Kingdom has the busiest Saturday in the state. Barton Celebrates starts at 11 a.m. at the Barton Public Library — plein air NEK artists, a historic village walking tour, a vendor fair, free food samples from local spots, and live music all afternoon. The Orleans County Fair flea market runs 9 to 4 at Roaring Brook Park in Barton. The Greensboro Art Fest fills the town green 11 to 3 with artists, music, and food. In Charleston, the historical society holds an open house and benefit yard sale 8 to 2. In Morgan, historian Howard Coffin speaks at the historical society at 1 p.m. for America 250. And on the Clyde River in Derby, the Memphremagog Watershed Association runs its 6th annual river cleanup 10 to 1 — canoes and lunch provided, RSVP required. Most of these are on the Barton Chronicle Kingdom Calendar; the cleanup is at Discover Newport, which also lists the Shine Your Light psychic and holistic fair at Gardner Park in Newport, 10 to 3.

St. Albans does a full Saturday: the Northwest Farmers Market in Taylor Park from 9, and Rising Rooted, a free community wellness fair at City Hall, 11 to 4, with local practitioners and demonstrations. Both via Downtown St. Albans.

Out in the islands, the Champlain Islands Farmers' Market sets up at St. Joseph's Church in Grand Isle 10 to 2, taking 3SquaresVT, Crop Cash, and Farm to Family coupons — Champlain Islands Farmers Market.

Windham County's pick is Dr Julian's Yes Yes at Stage 33 Live in Bellows Falls, 7 p.m., $20. Ethnomusicologist and drummer Julian Gerstin's new project, backed by serious jazz players, in a 40-seat room. It will sell out. Earlier, the Brattleboro Area Farmers' Market runs 9 to 2 on Western Avenue with fifty-odd vendors from Windham and Cheshire counties — Brattleboro Area Farmers' Market.

And in Shelburne, folk musician Rik Palieri closes out his residency at Shelburne Vineyard from 6 to 8 with fifty years of songs and stories.

Sunday, August 16

Bennington's Battle Day Parade steps off downtown at 12:30 p.m., with an anniversary service at the Old First Church at 10 a.m. featuring historian Phil Holland, and the encampment open at the monument 10 to noon. Worth noting: all Vermont State Historic Sites are free Sunday for Bennington Battle Day, which makes this the cheapest day of the year to see the Hubbardton Battlefield, the Chimney Point site, or the monument itself.

Brownington throws the party of the weekend up north. Old Stone House Day marks the museum's 190th anniversary, 11 to 3, with a full open house of all four floors of Alexander Twilight's granite school building, lunch from the Brownington Ladies Aid, a heritage craft market, blacksmithing and granite-cutting demonstrations, Jasper Hill cheese samples, a farm chore relay at noon and the famous pie auction at 1. Fifteen dollars per car at the gate, free for members. The Brownington Congregational Church is doing its own open house 12 to 3. Details at the Old Stone House Museum.

St. Johnsbury's Levitt AMP series brings Chambers/DesLauriers — three-time Blues Music Award winner Annika Chambers with guitarist Paul DesLauriers — to Dog Mountain at 5 p.m. Free, dogs welcome, with a free shuttle from the Fairbanks Scales lot and a 4 p.m. stop at the St. Johnsbury Welcome Center. Info at Catamount Arts.

The Stowe Jazz Festival runs its final day: mainstage 1 to 7, plus Chico Pinheiro's quartet at Cork from 1, Paul Asbell playing solo guitar at Archery Close, the Will Patton Ensemble doing gypsy jazz at The Alchemist, and a closing party at AWOL. The Stowe Farmers' Market is on Mountain Road 10 to 2 if you want to load up on the way out.

Randolph closes the Central Vermont Chamber Music Festival's 34th season at 7:30 p.m. at Chandler with A Special Concert for Walter Parker, honoring the longtime Vermont Public host — Spohr, Kahn, Shostakovich, and the Dohnányi Sextet. Twenty-seven dollars, students free, via CVCMF.

RENT closes at Weston Theater Company with a 2 p.m. matinee, Antigone plays its 2 p.m. matinee at Town Hall Theater in Middlebury, and Phantom Theater runs BDB Dance again at 6 p.m. in the Edgcomb Barn in Warren. Waitsfield's Joy runs Summer Sundays on the Green 11 to 5 — yoga at 11, lunch at noon, live music and an artists market from 2 — and Lawson's Finest has Bob Recupero for Sunday Sessions, 3 to 5.

St. Albans wraps things up with a City Wide Block Party in Taylor Park from 11 a.m. — Downtown St. Albans. And Shelburne Vineyard runs Kids Jam, its interactive children's concert series, 1 to 3 p.m. for five dollars — Shelburne Vineyard.

Still running all weekend

Billings Farm & Museum in Woodstock has its 40th annual quilt show, "A Vermont Quilt Sampler," plus a stained glass exhibition in the historic farmhouse, 10 to 5 all three days — Billings Farm. The Latchis Theatre in Brattleboro hosts Wagner in Vermont, opening Friday evening with a "darker" Tristan und Isolde and continuing Sunday with Der Fliegende Holländer — check with the Latchis for curtain times, which weren't posted as of Thursday. And Shelburne Farms runs its open-air wagon tours daily at 11:30 and Sun to Cheese tours at 2.

Thirteen of Vermont's fourteen counties have something worth showing up for this weekend, and most of it costs nothing. Pick a direction and go.