THE SPECTATOR – THE WASHINGTON COUNTY FAIR
Another year of the Washington County Fair has come and gone…the 147th and oldest in Texas….but the second guessing and social commentary linger on. Some people are complaining about the entertainment….others about the cost of admission to the VIP room and the food and drink offerings there…and some are complaining about the noise from the helicopter rides. Lost in all of the complaints is the fact that the Junior Livestock Auction set a new record with over $810,000 in sales. Together with the Commercial Steer and Commercial Heifer Sales, over $2.4 million was spent on animals at this year’s Washington County Fair. In a year when hundreds of local people were laid off or furloughed in the ice cream, oil patch and manufacturing industries, that’s a real testament to the strength of our business community.
Can improvements be made to the Fair? Certainly. I believe the Fair Board needs to consider whether it’s worth it to have entertainment on Thursday night. It doesn’t seem to matter who they book for Thursday night, no one shows up to hear them. As for the VIP room, that’s a nice perk for sponsors….and no one is forced to purchase tickets to it if they don’t want to. As for the helicopter….I’m sure it was a unique experience for the many folks who chose to ride it. But it did tend to get annoying after a while, and probably should not be an every year occurrence. I suggest that if you have ideas for improvements or changes to the Fair, contact a member of the Fair Board, or volunteer to serve on a committee that interests you. It takes hundreds of people and lots of hard work to pull off a weeklong event attended by more than 50,000 people. Kudos to all of those who served and worked on it.
One last thing about this year’s Washington County Fair. A young lady from Burton, Rhealee Spies, was rewarded with a bit of redemption. Two years after her Reserve Champion Steer was disqualified for having antibiotics in its system, Rhealee’s Grand Champion Steer sold for a record $23,000 at the auction. Although a local businessman waged a public war with the Fair Association over the disqualification, and to this day has not cashed the refunded $7250 check he wanted them to award her, Rhealee persevered. Her steer sold for more than triple that amount.
I leave you with these three clichés: “Life isn’t always fair.” “Rules are rules.” And “Hard work pays off”.
And that’s the way it looks to this Spectator.
Congrats to all the contestants with projects in the WCF! Congrats to the local businesses who ponied up the cash to help these kiddos and make this a successful sale for them.
Now…all this stuff about too much noise, VIP room, bad entertainment, and so on……well, to this resident it looks more and more like the fair is trying to imitate HLS&R in their attractions. Why do we need all of this? It’s a county fair for goodness sakes!! To be quite frank, the people that made the decision on the helicopter should immediately be relieved of their duties (as well as the president of the fair for not stopping this). If people only realized how many thousands of lives were put at stake each time that thing lifted off and landed….think about it people…….a helicopter crash could have wiped out a bunch of people in our community…..families, children, parents, brothers, sisters-you get my point. I’ve seen some pretty bad lapses in judgment at the fair but this is by far the most reckless endangerment of the public I’ve witnessed to date.
Price of the ticket? I could live with it if the fair were actually doing something productive with the money such as lowering the amount of commission the kids have to pay when selling their animals or lowering entry fees……but no…….what did they do this year????? Charge for tickets to the very kids exhibiting! Why? Because it’s all about the money.
VIP room?? Well, if people want to pay for the privilege to be a VIP then I guess that’s their prerogative but it still seems pretty crazy to me. If you are a true VIP, you don’t have to pay for that.
As for the young lady who made a comeback on her steer this year…….good for her!! As for the story……well, first not EVERYONE knew as Mr. Whitehead says they did. I for one had no idea, or perhaps I forgot about it as it’s pretty insignificant in the big picture. To those who don’t like the story…..too bad……there’s nothing wrong with repeating factual events that are part of a person’s history and that’s all the spectator did.
To Mac who discussed how he mentioned things to fair board members…….spot on man. I too have discussed things with board members and not one bloomin thing ever happens as a result. This is a tight knit circle and they do as they want to do and nothing different. Unfortunately, I don’t see much changing with the leadership over there at fair headquarters. Now, if you’ll excuse me I have a helicopter to catch………
And that’s the way it looks to this Chappell Hill Resident!
I to long for the fair of decades ago. Exhibits arrived for judging no later than wednesday, and we were not asked to pay to come in the gate to bring in exhibits. Texas Parks and Wildlife set up a large exhibit of native Texas creatures and educated all on the diversity and wonder of this state. Sometimes, Harley Berg would make an appearance. The carnival was there for sure, but smaller in size. Local organizations provided great cakewalks with scratch made baked goods, dunking booths with noted locals as the target, a trout fishing pond for youngsters, pony rides and many interactive exhibits. There were only a small handfull of places where volunteers from local organizations sold soda and food, and a place indoors to sit down and eat. No VIP full spread meals each night, just drinks and snacks pre and after auction. A good rodeo and some local muscians provided the entertainment. Where did it go?
I like the comments from “My Opinion”, not necessarily about being a ‘purist’, but let’s remember the origin of the Fair, and its original intent. The focus should be on, “IT’S AN AGRICULTURAL EVENT”.
Kind of like the City Slicker in his BMW complaining about having to follow a very slow trailer full of hay on FM2502 – DUH – it is a FARM to MARKET (FM) Road.
I’m a purist, so in that context, here goes.
In being everything to everybody, the event loses its basic focus, young people (and adults, too) showing and selling their animals. If you want to have a carnival venue, or a concert, do so—–separately. Don’t piggyback (and overwhelm with promotion) the peripheral entertainment on the basic reason for being there. It’s an AGRICULTURE event.
Also seems to me that one Thursday, Friday, Saturday is enough. The split weekend approach comes across to me as getting more admission charge opportunities. Which brings me to another point: If the season ticket price is $25 and the concert admission (after 6:00 PM or whatever) is near that for ONE time, the choice is pay the $25 for one time going or just skip it completely-which by the way I personally do.
I believe a 3 day Fair with the $25 season pass and a daily rate of something under $10 might produce more revenue with far less time on the backs of the volunteers than the current structure.
If you have other opinions, you don’t need to argue with me over mine, just state them.
I said at the beginning, it’s my opinion and right or wrong, I am entitled to it.
I haven’t actually ATTENDED the Fair in years, just watching and listening. As Yogi Berra
said, “You can learn a lot a by observing.”
While I feel country creations also qualifies as part of a true county fair (as some such as myself can’t – or couldn’t – raise animals), I like your idea. The split of the week – if only really a day – needs to also close.
It’s a county fair, not just an agriculture event. There are county fairs all over the United States, and almost all of them have other attractions including music, a carnival, etc. It’s a proven formula that works.
I have to wonder how many of the folks making negative comments are Fair volunteers, or volunteer their time for anything worthwhile for that matter.
I speak for myself – there were a lot of problems with this year’s fair. Many of them weren’t volunteer’s faults – just bad decisions board down. Mac said them quite well as far as the helicopter – I too noticed them and I didn’t go all week. I’m sure there will be a lot looked at this upcoming year.
I see this a lot when there’s discussion about the fair: “I wonder how many complaining are actually volunteers” or “If you don’t volunteer, then don’t complain.”
That argument is made only to try to shut down discussion.
Everyone in this county- whether they are a volunteer or not or whether they attend the fair or not – is entitled to their opinion and to criticize in an attempt to state what they like, don’t like or what they would change about the fair. It’s OUR fair – the Washington County Fair – not just the Volunteers’ fair.
That said, I disagree with the notion that the County Fair is an agricultural event. It may have started that way a looooooong time ago. But the fact is that we no longer live in a strictly agricultural-based county anymore. And Brenham is not an agricultural town. Rural? Yes. Agricultural? No. At least not in the majority. If anything, it’s a manufacturing town.
Concerts and carnivals and helicopter rides are part of the experience. The fair brings in a lot of money with concerts and carnival, etc. Cake walks aren’t going to do that anymore – at least not $2.4 million.
The helicopter rides may have been a “unique experience,” but simply put they were a danger to the animals and the children who were showing the animals. I saw SEVERAL steers and horses react pretty harsh toward the noise. Even some of the chickens suffered from it. I would expect the Fair Board to have used common sense that animals do not like sudden noises like that – especially in an agricultural town such as Brenham, without someone coming to them before then and saying “hey, won’t this affect the animals?”
I’ve actually talked to local restaurants and many won’t go to the Fair anymore because they’ve raised the costs so high to have a booth there they know the sales probably will at most make them break even. It’s one reason I personally go to the local businesses because I know they’re taking a gamble.
In many cases, I’ve talked to the Fair Board, especially as I’m one who uses my ticket every single day because when I pay $25 or so for a ticket I’m getting every cent of it. Most of the time it’s “we’ll think about it” and nothing is seriously done.
Being on a committee won’t be much help because they don’t handle the money and if the board doesn’t want to spend X for whatever event, they won’t do it. I see many disgruntled committees who are not upset with complaints from the public, but actually AGREE with them and have to say “there’s not much more we can do.”
As far as Rhealee Spies’ record sale, I’m tickled she set a new record with her steer (after add-ons, but still). That said, there is no need to bring back the past and take a jab at the incident two years ago. It’s in my honest opinion disrespectful to Miss Spies, who by taking that jab at the complainer, taints her accomplishment. Focus should’ve been on her, as it has been for steers for the past 147 years.
Anyone who was at the Fair following the Steer judging was talking about Rhealee Spies’ accomplishment two years after her steer was disqualified. That’s called “news”, and it’s a great story. Everyone already knew about what happened two years ago because a public meeting was held to air the grievances. The fact that she persevered and came back to win Grand Champion is definitely worth writing about, and should be honored. Anyone who is looking at it differently is reading something into it that is not there. Not everything in the news has to be negative.