[excited chatter]
[upbeat music]
[horse neighs]
[goat bleats]
[sheep baas]
- Jerry Apps: Now, coming into the fair as a kid,
the sounds that I enjoyed...
[cow moos, rooster calls, chicken clucks]
Oh, my gosh!
I'm back home again with all of these sounds.
[cow moos]
All those animal sounds
were mixed with the sounds at the midway,
the sounds of the gasoline engines running the rides,
and, of course, the sounds of people playing the games
and winning and losing.
[Pac-Man "game over" sound effect]
As a kid, my early memories of fairs included
all kinds of smells--
animal barns... [pig grunts]
the smells of food cooking.
[sizzling]
The sounds and the smells are forever embedded in my memory.
Those memories come back to me
every time I visit a county fair.
[gentle acoustic guitar music]
- Announcer: Funding for Jerry Apps: Meet Us at the Fair
is provided by the Wooden Nickel Fund,
Greg and Carol Griffin,
Elizabeth Olson,
the Stanley J. Cottrill Fund,
donors to the Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programs,
and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.
- Ticket Agent: There you go, thank you.
Have a good one.
Hello.
- Jerry: Fairs are one of those institutions
that have become traditional.
That's not to suggest that they haven't changed.
The fact that they have changed
is one of the reasons that they continue.
Fairs also brought people together from all over a county,
and sometimes it was only at the fair
that they got to meet certain people.
And so, they looked forward to it,
because they knew that Mable and John were going to be there
with their kids.
So the fair had a lot going for them
that wasn't immediately obvious,
but once you became acquainted with a fair,
you knew that it was gonna--
It was attracting people and continues to.
- Sadie Goettl: I have visited roughly
ten county fairs this year,
and love every single one of them.
I think they're important in communities
to bring all of our agricultural communities together,
but also the people who aren't as far in the ag community
as other people, and just bringing people together
and celebrating a very Wisconsin tradition.
- Donna Meier: It promotes community
between the rural segment of our county
and the urban areas
so people can come and see the people
that actually produce, you know, some of their food.
- Guy Dutcher: To see what happens when wonderful people
all pull together and give of themselves
and celebrate rural living and what we have to offer
in life here in central Waushara County.
- Heidi Hensel-Buntrock: My sister would always say,
as she goes from one end to the other,
it might take her two hours, which is probably
only a two or three-minute walk, but you end up connecting
with people who you have not seen for the last year.
[gentle acoustic guitar music]
[birds chirp]
- The idea of a fair, which was a religious institution,
as well as a place for businesspeople
to sell their wares,
it moved to northern Europe, where it morphed
into an agricultural fair
as well as business and religion.
Those northern Europeans who came to this country in droves
brought with them the idea of a fair.
So the very first fair in the United States was in 1807,
when Elkanah Watson of Pittsfield, Massachusetts
displayed his two Merino sheep in the town square.
Can you believe the first fair included two sheep, period?
That was it! [sheep baas]
Nobody had seen a Merino sheep before, apparently.
And so, they all came to see these two sheep.
["Call to Post" playing]
- Race Announcer: And they are...
- Jerry: And that's characteristic of a fair.
People often will come to the fair.
They go, "I've never seen that before.
"I just saw that advertised.
I'm going to come and see that."
- Race Announcer: Come on down...
[crowd cheering]
- Jerry: In Wisconsin, the very first fair was in Waukesha
in 1842, and it had cattle, horses, sheep, hogs,
and a plowing contest.
[harnesses rattle]
These early fairs only had men participating as exhibitors.
Women were not allowed,
and that didn't happen until 1884.
Let's invite women to bring the domestic products
associated with farm women.
And then somewhat later, somebody said, "Well, you know,
maybe the kids have something to share here as well."
[bright acoustic guitar music]
The whole idea was to prepare kids to be better farmers
and to prepare girls to be better farm women.
Farmers learned about how to integrate crops grown
along with the animals that they had.
And that's where the fair took that little bit of a twist
beyond just production agriculture,
realizing that farming is a way of life
and to make that life better,
here are some things that you might consider.
[mellow acoustic music]
[chickens cluck]
[cow moos]
The fair was sort of the pinnacle of the year,
always, for the 4-H members
because they got to show their calves.
It's very interesting because it's hard to put into words
the kind of relationship that develops
between an animal and a person,
when you are preparing it for the county fair, for example.
It doesn't matter if it's a hog or a beef animal,
but especially those animals that were taught to lead,
you develop a very special relationship.
They come to respect you, you come to respect them.
[cows moo]
- Aubrey'Anna Sims: I'm showing my steer.
His name's Teddy, and I've been working with him about a year.
I teach him not to kick it
when I touch his feet with a show stick.
For him to move his feet, for him to walk,
for him to not, like, kick people or anything,
those are some of the things I have to teach him.
And he's really fun to work with.
- Dale Meyer: Since I was about eight years old,
I started in 4-H at age nine.
I had Guernsey cattle, and I showed here at the barn,
and you got to pick out the best cattle in the herd.
If you're gonna bring a calf to the fair,
you better lead it a few weeks before the fair
so that it gets to know how to be led.
As most calves are stubborn,
well, you gotta work with the cattle.
[sheep baa]
- Jonathan Kraker: In the last two years,
I've started to show animals.
I've really enjoyed that and learned a lot.
Like, this year, I showed sheep for the first time.
[sheep baas]
I bought them in May, and so, I had to go pick them out,
pick a really nice lamb out.
I started working with them every day
pretty much right from the beginning.
You start by halter breaking them, walking them,
and getting them to brace.
Getting them ready for fair was fun.
It was a great learning experience.
I had a great mentor.
I was really happy how I did this year.
For my first year, I felt pretty good about how I did.
[cow moos]
- Jerry: When I was 11 years old, I was in 4-H
and showing cattle at the fair.
I first had to select a calf,
and I talked this over with my dad
because he'd had this experience,
showing at the fair previously.
He said, "You know what, Jerry?
Why don't you select this little bull calf?"
It was born during a huge snowstorm.
I named him Stormy.
And so, as soon as the little calf was, I don't know,
a month or two old, I began-- It was my dad's instruction.
"You need to teach little Stormy how to lead."
Now, Stormy was the most bullheaded bull you'd ever met.
He did not want to learn how to lead.
He did not want to learn how to do anything.
He had his mind made up that
he was gonna do what he wanted to do,
and most of the time, he did that.
Now, I'm just a little shaver and I'm saying to my dad,
"This calf is not going to learn how to lead.
"Well, I'm gonna quit doing this.
I'm gonna drop out."
He says, "Come on, now, be patient.
It just takes patience when you're working with an animal."
And so, I kept at it.
So, I'm now slowly, oh, ever so slowly,
he's learning how to lead.
By the time July rolled around
and we're getting ready for the fair,
I mean, he's a big animal now, but he has learned how to lead.
And so, now I'm at the Waushara County Fair.
When I arrive early at the barn,
I check to make sure that Stormy has water and has feed.
I would brush him down
so there was not a speck of dirt on him anywhere.
And Stormy, he's as nervous as I am.
I tied him up in the stall at the fair.
And I said, "Stormy, it's going to be all right."
Why would I say such a dumb thing to this animal
that gave me all this grief?
But we'd now developed this relationship.
And the next day or in the show ring
are all these other bulls,
and they're all kind of acting up and jumping around
and doing this and that and the other thing.
And my little Stormy is behaving himself.
And so, I get a blue ribbon.
So that first year working with Stormy, I will never forget.
I learned so much.
But what you are learning is patience,
and you are learning how to relate to an animal
in a very special way, and then, I suspect, joy,
just the wonderful feeling of, "We did it together,
Stormy and I."
There's joy into that.
- Charles Brewer: We showed at the Walworth County Fair
years ago, and we showed Guernsey cattle.
And then when we had kids old enough,
then they started showing calves at the fair.
They'd spend hours walking 'em around the yard
and then washing 'em and then clipping 'em,
and, you know, all of that thing.
It was a lot of work.
[hose sprays]
Both my son and daughter working animals.
They respect how to treat 'em.
They did it 'cause they knew it was the better way of doing it.
[upbeat bluegrass music]
- David Laatsch: A county fair is all about learning
and the process of learning one-on-one with the student
because face-to-face judging is critical in our area.
Typically, you're invited to judge a fair for two years,
and then you get a couple years off
and you come back,
and you see those same kids and how much they've grown
in those years since you first met them.
And it's very rewarding to be able to see the growth
from one year to the next.
I've been raising poultry all my life,
and then I started judging at various county fairs
across the state.
[chicken clucks]
- Makenzie Milestone: I have 17 birds here
at the fair today.
[chickens cluck]
When I show it, we bring them up to the judge,
and the judge places them in a line
of first to last on who he thinks is
the best of the category.
- David: We judge the birds
according to the standard of perfection,
which is established by the American Poultry Association,
and in doing so, every bird is evaluated
on its point value.
- If you are a champion,
which means, like, you're the best.
Reserve champion is, like, you're the second best.
- David: And then when it comes down
to picking the champions, it's always a small difference
between the top bird and the rest of the birds
that you've picked out for your champion prize.
- Makenzie: I've gotten a couple of reserve champions
for poultry today.
I actually got three champions and two reserve.
- David: To me, that is as exciting as judging a steer show
and having the grand champion steer
or the grand champion dairy animal.
And that's because to me,
that project is as important to that youth
as it is if it was the champion dairy cow in the dairy show.
- I feel so excited and proud of my work.
- When I became an extension agent in '57,
working at the Green Lake County Fair,
the extension agents were often selected
depending on their training and background to be fair judges,
and I was one.
My specialty happened to be beef, sheep, and hogs.
And people look at me now.
"You mean you judged beef, sheep, and hogs?"
Well, that's what I did for 10 years.
- Judge: To be completely honest, he's a little...
- Jerry: Being a judge is a very interesting job,
especially when you're judging animals, as I did.
And it's so fun to see the reactions of kids
letting their emotions show you how they accepted your judgment.
- Judge: First off, my compliments to you.
You've done an absolutely outstanding job.
[gentle acoustic music]
[steer moos]
- My dad, who, when he was in his 20s and newly married,
showed at the Waushara County Fair.
And I asked him one time--
I interviewed him when he was in his 80s.
"Well, why did you go to the fair?"
He said, "Well, I had a chance
"to compare my cattle with Joe's cattle,
"but I also had a chance
to meet farmers that I only saw once a year."
And he said it was the most wonderful thing in the world.
I said, "Where did you sleep?"
"Well, I slept on a load of hay
I brought along to feed the cows."
So he said, "I loved it."
And I said, "Gee, that sounds kind of primitive."
"It wasn't," he said, "because I had all these farmers,
"I only saw most of them once a year,
"and we just had more stories to tell each other
"than you could imagine,
"and we had this great competition.
"Now, is my cow better than your cow?
"Oh, who knows?
Well, we're gonna have 'em judged."
He just thought that stuff was fantastic.
Along the way, he was learning how to breed better dairy cattle
without realizing it, because he would see
what this other farmer was doing.
And, "What bulls have you used to be specific in your herd?"
"Oh, I'll tell you."
So it got to be his university, so to speak.
It's how he learned to improve his dairy herd.
He couldn't speak enough about it, how wonderful it was.
Why do we need a fair anymore?
[gentle music]
It's a place for those who know little
about where their food comes from,
to learn about it without realizing they are learning it.
It's all very subtle
and with entertainment as a part of it.
[gentle music]
Fairs go way beyond just something for farmers.
[cow moos]
Fairs are one way
of helping bring rural and urban America together.
It happens automatically.
That's the natural way of coming together,
and fairs allow for that.
[children speaking excitedly]
[upbeat acoustic guitar music]
What makes a fair a fair?
The exhibits.
People who bring their cattle, they bring their woodworking,
their canning and cooking and all that.
So, it's the judging, learning.
The educational component of the fair is still there.
Fairs in the upper Midwest
run generally from early July until September,
and it reflects the harvest time,
when the crops are ready to harvest,
so that those exhibits then can be brought to the fair
because they are ready.
The implement dealers would be at the fair,
showing off their new equipment,
and, of course, the entertainment dimension.
And not to forget...
[child shrieks]
...the rides, the midway, the foods.
All of those are essential components of a fair.
And each one in its own way attracts people.
So, the fairs do a lot of different things.
[kids cheer and yell]
[jaunty music]
- Film Narrator: A fair reflects the products and activities
of the region.
Local people take pride in their grounds.
- Jerry: Over the years, the challenges that fairs face
reflect the challenges that the society in general was facing.
For instance, during the Depression years.
It was a tough time for everybody.
Farm prices were terrible, people were unemployed,
so they didn't have any money to come to fairs
and that sort of thing.
So that was a problem.
And World War II, of course, sucked away
all of the young men to war, many of 'em, anyway.
And then, of course, right after World War II was polio.
Polio was everywhere.
Especially here in Wisconsin from '45-'55,
thousands of young men and women had polio.
And fairs suffered because some of 'em just shut down.
"We can't operate with this."
And then more recently, we're all aware of COVID
and how it shut down everything.
Individual fairs, of course,
suffered from fires, tornadoes, bad weather.
If your fair has run three days and every day it rains,
you're going to suffer
because the crowds are not going to be there.
By and large, the fair, as the years passed
and as they've faced the challenges, they've survived.
It makes for a fascinating history.
[bright acoustic guitar music]
A fair is really built on volunteers.
The volunteers do everything from parking cars
to helping with the judging, from running the food tents
to helping kids get to their dormitory,
if there's a dormitory at the fairgrounds.
- Attendee: Thank you so much.
- Jerry: Volunteers were at the gate selling tickets.
Most of the volunteers just love what they're doing, too.
They have just a whale of a good time.
- Barbara George: Because we've been involved here for so long,
you know the grandparents and the parents
of these young kids that come up.
And I really enjoy talking to the people.
The whole fair runs on volunteers.
It's great fun, and I think we feel good
about giving back to the community.
- County fair is the focus of the entire summer
for a community, particularly our agricultural community.
Whether it's recreation, entertainment,
it's all of those things that happen at the county fair.
[crowd cheers]
And it's all put on by, for the most part, volunteers,
who really love their community, love the kids,
love the activities of a fair
and do it because they remember what it was like for them
as a kid going to the fair.
[polka music]
- Charles: You know, and then you get to catch up
on their families.
And being small like this,
it kind of helps keep the community together.
[indistinct conversation]
- Guy: We call it our fair family,
and there are probably well north of 100 folks
who compose our fair family that all come together,
that put this on, and that's what makes it special.
[gentle acoustic guitar music]
- Jerry: When I was 12 years old and in 4-H,
and I always loved forestry.
And one of the exhibits at the fair was
to collect 20 different little pieces of wood
representing 20 different kinds of trees.
That's how I learned to identify a red pine,
a white pine, a black oak, and so on.
Twenty different ones.
Hang those things on a board,
and that became your exhibit at the fair.
- I did some projects, I did pictures, sewing.
- Painting. - Woodworking.
- Flowers and houseplants. - Recycling, knitting.
- Photography. - Crocheting.
- Crops. - Cake decorating!
- Gracelynn Schultz: Tomato, jelly,
and a whole bunch more.
It's hard to name 'em all.
- Mazi Dossa: This is my first year.
I did pretty good, I'm not even gonna lie.
I didn't know what to expect, so, I thought it was pretty fun.
My friend Mary influenced me because she was like,
"It's so fun, you should do it!"
So I was like, "Okay, I guess I'll try it."
I've been going to the fair for, like, ever,
and I'd see all these projects, I'm like, "Oh, my gosh.
Wish I could do that, but, like, I don't know how."
So, I was like, "Why not do it myself?"
So, I did a watercolor painting of a whole bunch of popsicles
'cause it looked pretty cool,
and then I did a painting of flowers.
I think I got first place in all of 'em except one of 'em,
but that's okay, because I know my mistakes
and I can change it for next year.
- Leah Rivera: I like that I can do what projects I want.
I can choose what projects I can do,
and I can do 'em how I would like to do it.
Well, I have made a vegan strawberry pie,
and then I got a Grand Champion on it.
And then I have Clothing Review.
I made a skirt and a shirt.
The fabric is from Mexico,
and I'm making that because I'm part Mexican.
My dad's from Mexico, so I decided to, for this year,
I'm gonna do where I come from.
- Sadie: You know, I love seeing
all the hard work the kids put into all of their projects.
They truly are the backbone of the county fairs,
and I love seeing all their hard work pay off and what they do.
- Jerry: One of the purposes of the fair,
which has been true for many decades,
it's an educational event.
It allows people, youngsters and oldsters alike,
to see how what they have made stacks up
with what somebody else has done.
- Bill Deppe: I've entered something
in the fair every year.
After I got out of 4-H, I started entering
in open class, and I just enjoy
the little bit of a competition it is,
and just to see how my stuff will do
compared to everybody else's across the county.
I brought some crops, and I got a third and a fourth on that.
And then my wife brought some zucchini bread
and some blueberry rhubarb bread,
and she got blue on both of those.
She was flying pretty high yesterday, so...
- Eunice Yanke: I've seen a lot of changes
in the number of articles that come in,
and the exhibitors have aged.
We have got some nice elderly exhibitors,
but I had fun this year.
My dinner rolls are champion
of the open class baking department.
The judge was so cute,
and she wanted to eat one of the dinner rolls.
I said, "Well, take it."
"No, no, I can't do it," she said.
- Jerry: As society has changed,
the kind of exhibits has changed.
When I was first in 4-H, there was no such thing
as a photography exhibit, for example.
Well, soon there was.
And there was no such thing as a computer-related exhibit.
Well, today, there are such things.
So the exhibits have changed as society has changed.
- Forrest Boocher: I entered, like, just like woodworking.
It is a U.S. quarter map,
but each state is its own state wood.
What I learned-- how to be perseverant
through my projects and to be flexible,
which is kind of hard with me. [laughs]
I just enjoy showing projects and all, like, the friendships.
I've had a lot of memories at this show.
- Gwendolyn Mahoney: I am showing flowers
and houseplants, cultural art, photography,
cake decorating, home environment.
I have a project in communications this year
and self-determined, and then
I also have swine and natural sciences.
And then I'm superintendent of flowers and houseplants
and I'm chairperson of knitting and crocheting.
I've been in 4-H for 10 years.
I just did the math this morning.
And I enjoy 4-H because it gives kids opportunities
to demonstrate what they've been working on all year.
Oftentimes kids make projects, yes,
for their parents and for different friends and stuff,
but they don't get a chance to display it in public
and show everyone what they've been working on
and putting all their energy into, and there's many
different areas that you can do things in.
So you can do everything from indoor archery to animals.
If you like to do woodworking, you can do that.
So there's areas for everything, which makes it open to anyone.
- What's that called when they get an injury
on the bottom of their foot?
- Barbara: And these kids learn so much here.
It's just a great way for them to exhibit what they've done
all year long and get a little bit of recognition,
and I love to see the smiles when these kids come
and we quiz 'em a little bit about what they're doing here.
The smiles are so big.
It just melts my heart.
- Jerry: When I would judge whatever it was I was doing,
I would take time to explain
why I was making the decisions I was making,
no matter if it was photography
or garden produce or an animal.
That's part of the educational dimension
to the fair is the judge becomes a teacher of sorts.
Not only is he or she
responsible for selecting quality over less quality,
but needs to be able to explain why.
You just don't do it because, well, that's the way it is.
You can't answer that way.
You're required to explain in some depth
what we're looking for.
What is a quality beef animal?
What's a quality cucumber?
What's a quality green bean?
That sounds silly,
but that's one of the requirements of a judge.
I was judging vegetables at a fair.
I don't know, maybe it was the Adams County Fair,
I don't know which one it was,
and I'm judging this cabbage, it's a beautiful cabbage,
and I tipped the cabbage over on the stem.
It says, "29," which means this kid bought this cabbage
at the grocery store. [laughs]
And so, I had to reject it
because it's, he didn't grow it, obviously.
That did not go over well with the parents either,
but they knew that they had been caught.
So they really didn't say very much.
But the kid really caught it because you just don't do that.
That's one of the things that's learned the hard way.
The judge pointing out to this youngster,
cheating is not a part of what we do.
Gotta be honest.
[gentle acoustic guitar music]
And it was in 1914 that the federal government passed a law
called the Smith-Lever Act, and that created
Cooperative Extension, and Cooperative Extension
provided funds to states and counties for 4-H,
agriculture, and family living.
The federal government realized that it was necessary
for agriculture to continue to improve,
and that's why they passed that law.
The Smith-Hughes Act was adopted in 1917,
and it provided funds to the high schools
of the nation to provide agricultural and other kinds
of vocational education.
That was the beginning of the Future Farmers of America.
They grew out of that high school agriculture.
They, the FFA, also were prominently involved in fairs.
And we shouldn't forget that.
- Carolyn Meyer: I joined 4-H when I was about 10 years old.
I'm the oldest of five children.
We were a farm family.
4-H was our social activity, and so,
the fair was a really big deal.
One of the projects that I did was sewing.
It was the first time learning how to use a sewing machine
and even threading needles, you know,
something really basic, and 4-H was my first experience
with public speaking.
Being a shy kid, that was a big step.
If it wasn't for 4-H,
I don't think there would be county fairs.
- I'm in the Waunakee Whirlwinds Club,
and this is my second year in 4-H.
I like how interactive it is.
I just like being around my friends.
I love making new friends
and I've done that here, and it's really fun.
- I'm in the Kegonsa Hustlers 4-H club.
This is my fifth year.
I like that there's so many opportunities to do everything.
So I get to show at the fair.
There's so many community service opportunities too.
There's lots of new friends.
We meet so many people.
- I was a summer 4-H agent back in 1972,
and my husband was a very young fair board member.
So we met working at this fair.
One of the life skills that 4-H teaches
is making new friends, and these are lifelong friends.
There are so many people that come
that I only see at the fair.
- Mary Arndt: We call 'em fair friends.
[sheep baa]
- I started 4-H, like, when I was in kindergarten,
like the first moment, then I started.
My sister was already in it, and then they brought me in.
This is, like, a great opportunity for me.
I've grown my friendships a whole lot,
and we can really bond together with each other.
- Bill: When I come here to the fair now, I see
so many people that I've met over the years and through 4-H
and it's just been-- it's been a great experience.
I just enjoy working with the kids and watching them grow
from these shy, little kids to these
confident young men and young women, and when they invite me
to a graduation party or their wedding,
or they'll send me a card, you know,
that's what keeps me coming back.
Sorry, I'm getting a little emotional,
but this is very important to me.
- Jerry: In 1946, right after the war ended,
and my dad knew the county agent in Wautoma,
and he had said to the county agricultural agent,
"You know, we ought to start a 4-H club
out in our school district."
And so, all of the kids in our one-room country school,
we all got together one evening,
and he's up in the front now and he's telling us about 4-H.
And I knew a little bit about it
because I attended the fair along the way,
but I wanted, oh, I thought it would be so wonderful
to be a 4-H member, because now I could
take a calf to the fair.
And I could be one of those who led the calf in a circle,
and I could stay overnight, for heaven's sakes.
Well, I didn't know where in the world
we were gonna stay overnight.
As it turned out, we bought an old, used army tent,
and we stayed in this old tent.
I was a 4-H member for 10 years, and I remember--
I remember that so well.
The 4-H members were my very close friends.
We competed with each other, but we all,
we also helped each other.
We got to know some new friends, but it was like a family.
It was a wonderful institution then and still is.
[gentle acoustic guitar music]
[upbeat steel guitar music]
The midway.
A fair would not be a fair without a midway.
The midway became popular at the Columbian Exposition
in Chicago in 1893.
It was a mile long,
and at that midway, they introduced the Ferris wheel.
As you look at all the pictures, generally speaking,
there's a Ferris wheel somewhere in the background.
And the Ferris wheel has a fantastic story behind it,
because it was in 1893 at the Columbian Exposition
in Chicago, the World's Fair,
that the management there wanted to have something to compete
with the Eiffel Tower in Paris, something that was as grand
as the Eiffel Tower, and they put the word out.
"Come up with something that's better than the Eiffel Tower."
And this engineer by the name of Ferris,
George Ferris, came up with the Ferris wheel.
And the first Ferris wheel then was in Chicago.
It was 250 feet in diameter, it was an enormous Ferris wheel.
The county fairs saw that.
"We can have a Ferris wheel."
They got a Ferris wheel.
Not one that was 250 feet in diameter, but smaller.
[playful circus music]
The merry-go-round is the second common ride in a fair,
and the Tilt-A-Whirl is another one, that's three.
Then there are car rides.
There are all kinds of other rides.
So the midway then became an essential part of the fairs,
along with the cattle barns and the poultry barns
and all that kind of stuff, the beer tents.
There was the midway,
and it's where the kids and the young people
met their spouses at the fair, often on the midway,
riding the rides.
- Noah Ballinger: But I love going on the rides.
That's, like, one of my favorite things about the fair,
because I have fun with my friends
and I can just, like, scream all day.
[riders screaming]
- My favorite ride is the Ferris wheel.
- The Tilt-A-Whirl. - Loop de loop one.
- Freak Out.
- The roller coaster.
- The one where you slide down with the mats.
- The scrambler. - Hi!
- I love the Ferris wheel.
- Tilt-A-Whirl, easily.
- I like the Merry-Go-Round, that's just my speed.
- Guy: The Octopus.
I had not been on the Octopus for several years
until my almost teenage son took me on it
three consecutive times.
I was not probably in a position where I should have driven home.
[child screams]
- I like the merry-go-round
because they go up and down and it has music and horses.
- Dale: At night when we'd sneak out of the dormitories,
we'd walk underneath of the rides
and Rock-O-Plane would go upside down, and the people's money
would fall out of their pockets and fall on the ground,
and us kids would pick it up, and then we could
go on some more rides ourselves.
- I'll be honest, I'm not a ride person.
Those things scare me.
They set them up, like,
two, three nights before and I'm like, "No, thank you."
[playful music]
[upbeat music]
- Jerry: Well, the fairgrounds is, in many ways, it's seen
as a symbol for the entertainment dimension
of the fair. ["Call to Post" playing]
- Race Announcer: And they're off and on their way!
- Jerry: If you want to attract people to the fair,
especially those who are not
particularly interested in agriculture,
you needed something to bring them there.
And that's where the entertainment come in.
People could see at a fair something they couldn't see
any other place.
As fairs evolved,
music became more and more a part of the fair.
[groovy blues music]
Not only in the grandstand, but generally in special tents.
And I can, again, remember
as a kid going into a tent and there was a guy
playing the guitar and a gal singing.
Country-Western music was very popular, of course.
It was good, I enjoyed it very much.
[upbeat country music]
And music today is still
an extremely important part of the fair.
It's one of the attractions for younger people, to be sure.
[upbeat rock music]
The entertainment at the fair has changed
as society has changed,
but I read-- I've forgotten which fair it was,
but people came and filled the grandstand to watch a man
walk backwards and be timed as to the speed with which
he could walk a mile backwards, which to me sounds like
the dumbest thing in the world. [laughs]
People would come to see that.
And then the very early draws were horse races.
[upbeat blues music]
And then to go another step from horse races to buggies,
[engine revs] that was another iteration.
If my horse can pull better than your horse, well,
my tractor can surely pull more than your tractor.
So we had tractor pulling contests, and that's
still around as well. [engine roars]
As the years went by, we had car races,
then demolition races,
and all that kind of stuff were popular, still are.
So the entertainment has morphed
from the very simple to the more complex to maybe
more sophisticated, although I hesitate to use that word,
[chuckles] kinds of entertainment today.
[engine roars]
- Charlene Turner: We always enjoyed the Sauk fair
because of the different things they had.
I was never to a tractor pull before I got married,
and I got married at 17, just outta high school.
So we were coming over to the tractor pulls because
a lot of times, my husband had a tractor in the tractor pull.
[engine roars]
At that time, they had a, like a boat that just
dragged the tractors, dragged it, and they'd have people
in the audience that were on the lower seats would stand up
and stand on it as it went along,
'cause it was very slow, and then when it
was enough people on it, it would get stopped.
I always thought that was kind of funny.
My sons took over the farm, and they're still
bringing in tractors.
[engine roars]
I know my brother-in-law is and his family is.
They really enjoy it.
- I guess we really have fun
with the tractor pull and the truck pull
and the demo derby that they have.
That's always, a lot of people, I don't know,
I hate to see cars smashed up, but a lot of people
love that kind of thing, so, it's amazing what they can
get the horsepower outta, whether it's a truck
or a tractor, and being a farmer myself,
that piques my interest in that kind of thing,
so, I guess what we come to the fair for.
[engine roars]
[cheerful tuba music]
- Jerry: I will never forget as a kid, walking down the midway
and smelling hamburgers frying.
[sizzling]
Oh, that's such a wonderful smell.
And I didn't have any money, so I couldn't buy this,
these hamburgers, but I could smell them.
Food and fairs go together like gloves and hands.
They're a very important part of a fair.
As we look at the history of fairs over the years,
food has been a very important part of these fairs.
And one of the other dimensions of food at the fair,
which came because people wanted to see things.
They didn't want to sit around and eat.
So they invented the idea
of portable food, food on a stick.
You could get bratwurst on a stick,
hamburger on a stick, bacon brats on a stick.
Breakfast on a stick, brownie waffles on a stick.
Chicken in a waffle on a stick.
Deep fried bacon and cream stick on a stick.
Deep fried Snickers on a stick.
You can get almost anything on a stick so they can
carry it around and eat.
When I first started going to the fair in the late 1930s,
the idea of everything on a stick, it wasn't there.
I didn't, I don't remember anybody running around
with a corndog on a stick.
You can find food at fairs that you can't find anyplace else.
And some of it is downright exotic,
especially at the State Fair.
Each year, they have a special list of new foods,
almost all of them on a stick.
Wisconsin was settled by a number
of Germans and Polish people.
They knew about beer.
They knew how to make beer in their home country.
They brought their skills here.
[upbeat polka music]
Some of the fairs developed the beer tent
as sort of a replica of what they remembered
from the beer gardens of Milwaukee.
And the beer stand, along with the food stand,
became a part of almost every fair.
And these were usually run by local organizations
like the churches and the VFW and the American Legion,
all of those.
4-H leaders,
they were all a part of the food scene at the fair.
- Customer: I want a pork sandwich.
- Dale: We always went to the 4-H stand and got
roast beef sandwiches or hamburgers
or anything away from home was always good to eat.
- Donna: I enjoy all the fair food.
I try to get to the 4-H food stand
and the fire department stand and the Farm Bureau stand,
and then all of the other ones that come to supply us
with food and ice cream.
- David: The favorite food is, was always
the malted milkshakes at the 4-H food stand.
And the reason I say that is because we were 4-H members,
we had to work at the 4-H food stand.
[playful music]
- Jerry: One of the special foods at fairs is cotton candy,
and it goes back to the 1900s.
And it sounds so contradictory
because cotton candy is spun sugar
and it was invented by a dentist. [laughs]
And it was first introduced at the St. Louis World's Fair
in 1904.
That's the beginning of cotton candy.
Then there are funnel cakes.
The Pennsylvania Dutch came up with that idea.
And then there are some specialties that
fairs are known for.
The Wisconsin State Fair, now in West Allis,
has cream puffs as one of their featured foods.
And people come by, literally by the thousands,
and eat these special cream puffs.
- Carolyn: One of the Farm Bureau stands here
has cream puffs.
I might have to have a cream puff before I leave today, too.
- I guess I'm probably gonna have to say, oh, gosh.
I'm gonna say cream puff
just because I'm so glad they're back.
- Eunice: This year, we have cream puffs,
so we are all anxiously waiting.
I think we're all gonna kind of share
a cream puff yet.
- Right now it's the cream puffs. [laughs]
And the lemonade and the little donuts and...
I'm old school.
[playful music]
[swinging music]
- Gwendolyn: Whether you're showing
or you're just coming to the fair,
there's so many great people to meet at the different stands
and the different events that are going on.
There's always someone to talk to and learn from.
And so, I think it's a good learning opportunity
for anyone that wants to learn more about 4-H
or fair projects, or just meet new people from
different aspects of life.
- Noah: It's good to, like, interact with people
around your county that you wouldn't see otherwise.
And it's, like, a good educational thing for, like,
agriculture and stuff as well.
- Makenzie: You learn so much about animals,
animal care, agriculture.
You can learn about lots of different things
just by reading posters all over the fair,
and lots of different things
that you probably don't know about.
- Bill: The thing I think that is the most important
about the fair is the kids get to show
their animals and meet new people and make new friends,
renew old friendships.
Just to see how they did on their projects,
and adults as well.
[razor buzzes]
- Jonathan: I think it's really important
to see how hard these kids work with their animals
and the hard work that goes into all the projects,
not just the animals, but projects.
A lotta hard work goes into it.
And so, I think for others to see that, it's important.
[horse neighs]
- Gary Kaun: Statistics show that we're five or,
four, five, six generations away from the farm.
They're the ancestors of the people living in towns.
They can come out here and see how the animals are
and the fact that we are good herdsmanship people,
that we do care about our animals.
- Bailey Blader Lucht: I really think that it's neat
for a lot of people to, like, come and see
the different animals and the hard work, really,
that the kids put in to bring their animals here,
that a lot of the kids who don't live on farms
or don't have the animals can come and see them,
and just seeing them smile and go through all the barns,
and it's really a nice sight to see.
- Samuel Wells: It just-- It's a big community thing.
The whole community gets together.
They have a big fair.
They go out and just have a great time.
You can't go wrong with the fair.
- Bill: I always look forward to the fair.
When my kids got out of 4-H, my wife said, "You know,
you're not gonna have to go to the fair every day anymore."
I said, "I know I don't, but I will."
[hammer thuds] [bell dings]
- Jerry: The fair is an educational institution.
As a teacher, I have-- longtime teacher,
I have always promoted the learning that takes place
away from the book and out of the classroom,
and the fair is one of those places where it occurs.
The fair is a place to have fun.
The fair is a place to meet old friends.
A fair is a place to eat exotic food on a stick. [laughs]
The fair is a way of helping youngsters, oldsters,
and everybody in between see where our food comes from
straight away.
It shows us how to do it without realizing
we are learning so much about each other.
[bright music]
When you mention "fair," I am immediately thrown back
to my days as a 4-H member, and I can remember this old,
ratty tent that we bought.
When you say "fair," I am immediately in that tent
with all my 4-H buddies, and we're sleeping on these cots
and we were getting up at 5 o'clock in the morning
because we gotta get down to the barn and take care of the calves
and to brush them and fix them up for the fair.
We spent hours making, curling their tails
and making them look wonderful.
Those are the memories that I have now.
If you ask somebody else, they might say,
"Well, I met my spouse at the county fair."
Well, gee whiz, tell me that story.
It might be the person who one year
had the grand champion beef animal.
Someone else might say, "Well, what I think about
"is I'm meeting friends that I haven't seen
for a long time," but the memories are all there,
and they're deeply implanted.
Those memories of the fair I have will never go away.
[gentle music]
[crowd chatter]
My dad told me this story, which I think is...
sounds exactly like what some sideshow people would do.
There was a big sign out front that said,
"Come in and see the horse with his head
where its tail ought to be."
I mean, who wouldn't want to see that?
And people lined up, and they paid 50 cents each
to see this horse with his head where its tail ought to be.
And there was a dark tent, and they would
go into this dark tent, and here was a
big Belgian draft horse backed into its stall.
Its head was where its tail ought to be. [laughs]
And people walked out.
They were so embarrassed that they paid 50 cents.
They wouldn't tell anybody else that they'd been taken,
and the long line continued.
- Announcer: Funding for Jerry Apps: Meet Us at the Fair
is provided by the Wooden Nickel Fund,
Greg and Carol Griffin,
Elizabeth Olson,
the Stanley J. Cottrill Fund,
donors to the Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programs,
and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.