Sanders County Fair draws 3,000 entries

The 97th Annual Sanders County Fair began on Monday after months of preparation.

Mike Hashisaki, the Sanders County Fair manager, is in his 17th year working with the fair and he said that the fair has been around since 1911.

“This is the largest no-gate fair in Montana,” he said.

By no-gate, Hashisaki means that there is no charge to get into the fair. The only charge is for parking. Most of the other large fairs in the area have a gate and charge for people to get in the fair.

Hashisaki said that he and Kim McNeil work all year-round in order to make the process go smoother once fair time comes around. After school ends, Ruth Hamilton starts acting as secretary. They also rely on volunteers to help them get everything in order.

Last year’s fair, Hashisaki said, drew a historic number of people, although the actual count is a little hard to pinpoint, since there is no money collected at the gate and no real way to get an exact tally.

“The fair commission estimated that there were 45,000 visitors to our fair last year,” Hashisaki said. “However, I tend to be a little more conservative and I’d say there were probably about 35,000.”

Regardless, Hashisaki said that they plan on having around 50,000 people visit the fair throughout the week. “On Thursday it is a county fair,” he said. “Then on Friday it turns into a regional fair, and then by Saturday it just gets completely out of control.”

This year the fair has a budget of $400,000 and they’ve been putting the money to good use.

The main new thing that will be at the fair this year are Priefert bucking chutes. Hashisaki said that the chutes were used once in Pocatello, Idaho and that Priefert didn’t want to take them back to Dallas, Texas, and the Sanders County Fair was able to purchase them for $114,000, which equated to a savings of over $85,000.

There are also new showers at the fairgrounds that are primarily for 4-H members when they need to get ready for their presentations, although Hashisaki said that the showers will be available for anyone to use.

The fair got around 3,000 entrants, which is about on par with what they had last year.

Hashisaki said that the most popular event at the fair is by far the Demolition Derby, which sells out every year. There are 4,000 seats in the arena and Hashisaki said that the seats will definitely sell out by Saturday, but will likely all be gone by Friday. He said that the rodeos will also sell out and those hold around 3,000 people.

He said that the motocross is also really popular, but it is a lot of work to put on because they have to build up jumps in the stadium for it and then remove them all in time for the rodeos.

Last year the fair started mini-bullriding and this year they’re holding the state championships of it.

One Monday the fair will be accepting all of the nonperishable items for judging, including needle-point, arts, crafts, and photography. The judging for these will be on Tuesday.

On Wednesday they will accept the entrants for perishable items, such as vegetables and flowers will come in as well as livestock, with this judging taking place on Thursday.

Hashisaki said there are four “mid-ways” of the fair, or different sections. He said that one of the selling points of the Sanders County Fair is the fact that all of the mid-ways are on grass, which isn’t the case at most of the other fairs.

One mid-way is were the carnival is. Hashisaki said there will be 18 rides total, with 5 kiddy rides and then 13 major rides that will be more suited for teenagers and adults. He said that at most fairs, you have to buy a pass to ride the rides for a specific time during the day, however that won’t be the case at the Sanders County Fair.

“We’re doing ride passes from noon until midnight for $20,” he said. “All people have to do is pick the day that they want to do it. This should give the teenagers plenty of time to get sick,” he added with a laugh.

The other mid-ways will be a food court mid-way, a vendor mid-way and the 4-H mid-way.

Hashisaki said the vendor or flea market mid-way is always really interesting. “There are all sorts of items over there,” he said. “You can get a little bit of everything over there.”

The fair advertises all over the area and gets people from Washington, Idaho, British Columbia and even farther away to come and see how Sanders County puts on a fair.

Hashisaki said that they’ve been working on clean-up for about two months now in anticipation for the start.

Last weekend concession groups arrived at the fair to start setting up their booths and vendors have to check in by 6 p.m. tonight.

Hashisaki said he looks forward to the fair, and given the large attendance, a lot of other people do to.

“This really is one of the best fairs out there,” he said. “There is a lot going on and it is just a great atmosphere.”