Officially called the Mendocino County Fair, most of the effort is committed by Anderson Valley people. The Redwood Empire Fair, held annually in Ukiah, is more representative of the County, having moved from being merely depressing to depressing. The Boonville Fair retains much of the old-time atmosphere of a truly rural production while Ukiah has gone the way of dirt, tractor pulls and depravity.
I’ve always liked to visit the Fairgrounds on noon on Friday, opening day. Everything is still fresh. The floral exhibits have not begun to wilt. It is possible to smell the baked goods and perking coffee. The low-lifers and drunks are still asleep and the urbans are still racing northward along 101. In an uncrowded, leisurely tour around the grounds it is possible to meet and talk with people you might not see for another year.
Standing in a short ticket line I waited patiently behind an elderly woman, obviously a tourist, who was attempting to establish her identity as a senior citizen and thereby gain entry at the reduced rate. The woman was seventy if she was a day. The ticket taker said she was sorry but the old lady would have to produce confirming evidence of her age in the form of a driver’s license “or something” if she were going to be admitted at the senior’s discount. The old lady gestured feebly in the direction of downtown Boonville, the heat shimmering in front of the Mannix Building. “My wallet is in my car over there somewhere,” as if it might as well have been parked in Nome, Alaska. A man appeared at her elbow to identify himself as her son. He vouched for his mother’s age. The ticket taker didn’t budge. No i.d., no senior ticket.
One sees more and more of this Good German kind of sadism. “I’m sorry, sir, I don’t make the rules. It’s policy.” In a properly-ordered world the response would be, “I’m even sorrier than you because I will have to take your life for the pain and anxiety you have gratuitously caused this elderly woman.”
I began my annual tour of the Fair with a quick look at the animals. Years ago I decided to send away for some chickens. I figured that since I lived in a rural area I should at least give one species of barnyard beast a try. The things arrived in the mail which seemed a feat in itself and then befouled my bathroom for five or six weeks until I finally put them out in the chicken house. That night a skunk got all forty of them, operating more like a vampire than a real predator by sucking their blood out of single gashes in their throats and leaving the meat. Ever since I’ve had uncritical admiration for people who can successfully raise animals. The embattled family farms who eke out livings off the land seem to me much more remarkable and worthy of support than the hordes of high-tech computer wizards whose major contribution to date has been to bring us closer to big brotherism. The chicken house at this year’s Fair was very impressive, a genuine how-to-do-it model of poultry production. Living up here, we forget that a majority of our fellow citizens don’t know what a fresh egg tastes like, having been raised on supermarket chemical-soaked spheres which bear no relation, other than appearance, to the real thing.
From the chickens I moved onto the horseshit, the John Birch Society Booth, located in its usual spot to the rear of one of the main exhibit halls, positioned in such a way that many Fair goers would miss it. The same aged couple was dispensing the same old uninformed conspiratorial baloney. I asked them the same question I ask them every year: If the Rooskies are unable to feed themselves how is it they are able to mount such an effective worldwide conspiracy involving, apparently, millions of them and, according to you nuts, many Americans? The lady squinted knowingly at me, “We know you.” She said it as if I were an agent of the Comintern sent to Boonville on behalf of its vast subversion, Boonville being of absolutely vital strategic importance in the grand game. “Do you want them to get all this?” She stabbed her index finger in the direction of rows of farm tractors. “Not only can they have that,” I responded, “I’ll throw in the Chrysler Corporation and all of Ukiah. We can end the Cold War tomorrow.”
Onward to the art exhibits. With the exception of perhaps five pieces, the art and photography is utter shlock nearly rivaling in hideousness the truly ghastly collection lining the walls of Ukiah’s Adventist Hospital. There is are that is so bad it can be dangerous to your health. God knows how many of the infirm have been finished off when they cast and unwary glance at the walls of Adventist Hospital. As usual the least original work is awarded ribbons. But outside, in a display case, is an interesting collection of local Indian artifacts arranged by Boonvillian, Wayne McGimsey. And there is a stunning roll top desk done by the gifted Philo woodworker, Tom McFadden. I briefly consider stealing the roll-top but realize there is no way to get it off the premises undetected.
The grand exhibits are always amusing because of their wholly unwarranted optimism and their idealization of the past. The themes of these creations are impressively vast. The Peachland Preschool won first prize this year with an exhibit called “Once Upon A Time,” a Grandma Moses-like creation of a conservative’s fantasy of what went before. Each of the exhibits is required to be constructed out of the agriculture products of California. One year, a display was knocked out of first place when a sharp-eyed judge spied a slice of pineapple used to depict an outhouse crescent moon. Anderson Valley High School, finishing third out of three entries, has concocted an incoherent clutter of raisins and peanut granules titled, “Has Man Progressed?” That should be simple. An emphatic six-foot “NO!” spelled out in prunes would do it. As it is, the answer to the high schoolers question seems to be there may be some life left after a nuclear blast.
Sliding east a few yards I find Norman Clow, Sean Donovan and Jerry Bowers tinkering with a model train display. Norman greets me by reciting a Country Joe lyric. Country Joe appeared in concert at this year’s Fair, packing in nostalgic hippies from all over the County. And for those of you keeping track, Country Joe has not sold out. Fortunately for Norman there are no Reaganauts around to hear his recital or he would be bounced out of the Republican Party on the spot. I remarked to the three gents that their train set-up looks a bit sparse. Donovan points out that he put fourteen hours on one tiny replica of a water tank alone. The railroad will ultimately reproduce in miniature the old rail line that ran from Christine, just south of Navarro, through Comptche and up along the Albion Ridge to the Coast. Fourteen hours on a single model seems excessive, but we all pay tribute to the glory of God in different ways, I suppose.
As I chatted with the train moguls, an emaciated, waifish little hippy circled the trains. He could have stepped directly from a nineteenth century London slum. Oliver Twist’s roommate. There aren’t many of these counterculture feral children left around here most, fortunately, have been trundled off to their grandparents for last-ditch salvage operations. A fire team of porcine Reaganauts tut-tutted the waif while giving him wide berth. The wild child whistled and sang to himself as he watched the trains circle Donovan’s water tower.
My favorite stop is always the pie booth, this year as always staffed by Joan Bloyd, Janet Gowan and Grandma Pie herself, Ruby Hulbert. The goods are dispensed with dollops of friendliness. It is peaceful here, away from the heat and the hucksters. Still hungry after wolfing down fudge, pie, ice cream and coffee, I bought a hunk of deep fried mystery meat from the unhealthiest-looking man I’ve ever seen outside a hospital. The guy hunched over his vat of turbulent grease, sweat running off him, to plunge what were billed as hunks of chicken into the tubs of bubbling lard.
It was a good Fair, unique in many ways to this unusual area, and certainly one of only a few like it left in the country. Rural still has the edge.
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