The Colorado State Fair in Pueblo just ended its annual run. It began as an exhibition by the Southern Colorado Agricultural and Industrial Association on Oct. 9, 1872, so this year’s fair was the 136th rendition.
And I just marked my 56th year of residing in Colorado without attending our state fair. The closest I came was in 1989, when George Thorogood and the Destroyers were on the fair’s bill. (Who wouldn’t want to hear “Bad to the Bone” live?) But I discovered that the World’s Greatest Bar Band was playing the next night in Avon, near Vail. Given the choice between driving down to sweltering Pueblo in August or staying in the mountains, it was an easy decision.
The state fair often loses money. Attendance was up this year but down the preceding two years. The legislature is reluctant to fund it. So what are the problems?
Entertainment? Perhaps the fair is booking acts without broad appeal. In other words, there are Coloradans who are unlikely to go see a hyper-patriotic country band, just as there are those unfortunates who aren’t fond of loud and dirty rock ‘n’ roll. But the fair spans the spectrum of popular music, so that doesn’t seem to be a problem.
Participation? This year, fair management required all livestock entries to participate in the “voluntary” National Animal Identification System, which involves registering premises and critters with a federal database. Many small producers despise this Big Brother program, and thus did not enter the state fair.
While I understand the rationale for food safety, I find it much easier to trust a 4-H kid than the U.S. Department of Agriculture under the Bush administration. Two state legislators have promised to introduce bills that will forbid the fair from demanding NAIS participation; if they’re successful, this problem will go away, and it should.
Urbanization? The theory is fewer people have any direct connection with agriculture anymore, and so fewer people are interested in what is, at heart, an agricultural exposition. But by that logic, the National Western Stock Show in Denver should have faded years ago, and instead, its attendance grows.
Further, our state fair isn’t just about who has the best bread-and-butter pickles. It has produce categories, like wine, that even the most urbane Coloradans enjoy. This should enhance the state fair, not hurt it.
Promotion? The special steam-powered train this year doubtlessly helped bring attention to the state fair, but the fair could do a better job. Maybe we need to become an “early presidential” state so that candidates come to our fair, rather than Iowa’s.
Location? Until well into the 20th century, Pueblo was Colorado’s second-largest city. It was the leading city of Southern Colorado, which had a third of the state’s population in 1900. Now, Southern Colorado has but a tenth of the state’s population, and Pueblo ranks only 9th, trailing even such suburban venues as Thornton, Westminster, Arvada, Aurora and Lakewood.
But Pueblo is on an interstate highway and it isn’t really that far away from metro Denver. If Coloradans can get to Telluride for a bluegrass festival, or to Crested Butte for a wildflower festival, they can certainly get to Pueblo if they want to.
Timing? A recent letter to the editor suggested fair attendance would improve if it were held earlier in the summer, before school starts, so that more families could attend. However, school starts early these days, long before the end of August (and creeping forward every year). If the fair tried to cope that way, eventually we’d be celebrating the fall harvest before spring planting.
Emphasis: The fair ought to return to its agricultural roots, but with a different focus. Hardly anybody really cares who’s got the biggest zucchini, but there’s great and growing interest in local foods and sustainable agriculture. Farmers markets get ever more popular.
The fair started as a way to bring agricultural producers and consumers together, and if it shifted more in that direction now, it ought to grow.
And if they’d wait to hold the fair until the end of harvest season, when it’s pleasant in Pueblo instead of stifling hot, I might even go. At least back in 1872, when the exposition opened on Oct. 9 instead of Aug. 24, they knew the better time to visit Pueblo.
Ed Quillen of Salida (ed@cozine.com) is a former newspaper editor whose column appears Tuesday and Sunday.
