Comments on the Virgina State Fair

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THE VIRGINIA STATE Fair just completed its maiden voyage at The Meadow Event Park–sandwiching the cool corporate word "Event" between the pleasingly pastoral ones "Meadow" and "Park"– in bucolic Caroline County. For longtime fairgoers, the change in venue was bittersweet. For so many years in late September, we’d found our collective thrills on Richmond’s Strawberry Hill–since 1945, actually, when young Virginia families, seeking pleasant diversions after the tribulations of World War II, found that the State Fair provided the good, clean fun so emblematic of that simpler era.

Despite the change, all those things you remember from childhood fairs remain. The aroma of funnel cakes still mixes (not unpleasantly, oddly enough) with those bovine, porcine, and caprine odors emanating from the livestock pens. Mock-horror (and some very authentic) squeals from the midway punctuate the happy murmur created by thousands of people as they gawked at and ambled by all those food vendors, craft displays, and other amusements (including such sui generis entertainments as racing pigs and chain saw sculptors). And the midway continues to feature such rickety (the thrills are not all engineered; some are "value added" due to indifferent maintenance) rides like the Tilt-A-Whirl, the Zipper, and the Himalaya. There are plenty of kiddie rides, too, for the little sensation seekers.

And no midway is complete without the really strange stuff. How about Angel, the Snake Girl? Or the World’s Smallest Woman? The World’s Largest Horse? The World’s Longest Snake? You get the picture: the biggest, the smallest, the most extreme. Sideshows have always been about deviations from the mean. (To say nothing about the mean deviants who sometimes prowl the midway. Just let it be said: Freak shows exist both inside and outside those darkened, ominous trailers.)

And what about the "midway"? Midway to what, exactly? Destitution, perhaps? Five bucks for a few lazy spins on the Ferris wheel! Four bucks for a plastic sack–alas, where are the sticky paper cones of yesteryear?–of multicolored cotton candy! A couple of bucks for a kid just to stick a magnetized "fishing rod" into a similarly magnetized "pool of fish" to haul in a prize worth maybe a nickel! Or how about those eternal (and infernal) Guess Your Age & Weight guys? I don’t know about you, but the last thing I want after wolfing down a tub of fried Oreos, half a funnel cake, and a hot dog is to pay someone to opine loudly about my girth.

To be honest, I always kind of liked the looming presence of Richmond International Speedway at the old Fairgrounds. I’ve been to a few NASCAR races in Richmond over the years, and the Fair always brought back memories of those intoxicating race evenings. I think, too, that I liked the idea of entertainment consolidation, the multiple events the old fairgrounds hosted. Besides racing and the fair, there were wine festivals, rose competitions, other happenings. Going to the State Fair was, and remains, one of those significant time-markers in our family. My kids are small, so the happy expectation of going to the Fair helps mollify the less-happy facts of summer’s end and school’s beginning.

Regarding the new Caroline County location, let me be honest: I’m kind of a location purist. When a team is called the New York Giants, I expect them to play their games in New York. After all, there are five boroughs to choose from and the last time I checked, the Meadowlands in East Rutherford, N.J., wasn’t in any of them. Same with our own Washington Redskins. Good ol’ RFK Stadium was, as it should be, in Washington. I resent singing "fight for old D.C." in some godforsaken, sell-your-soul-to-the-highest-bidder place called FedEx Field in Landover, Md. (I guess being a billionaire–we’ll mention no names here–means never having to say you’re sorry. Ask Jim Zorn.)

Maybe my logic is less than compelling, but I want the Virginia State Fair to be in the Virginia state capital. It’s a curmudgeonly and perhaps nit-picky demand, but I’m sticking to it.

And how about the agricultural remnants of the State Fair? Livestock and produce once were sort of the point. Fairs–really harvest festivals–were places where rural people gathered to size up each other’s poultry, pigs, pound cakes, and pumpkins. And now? Well, we still dutifully troop by all those carefully transported farm animals and freakish vegetables, but our appreciation is muted, rote, and reflexive since we’ve really lost touch with the soil. While we’re happy for the winners of the Best Quilt or Biggest Squash or Most- Milk-Producing Heifer (festooned with ribbons), we’re largely estranged from farm life and rituals. Do once-vibrant organizations like the Future Farmers of America still exist? If you do, please don’t descend on me with manure-encrusted hoes and pitchforks–I’m supposing these farm implements would be your logical weapons of choice–because I mean no disrespect. I just honestly don’t know. I go to the Fair, like everyone else, mainly for the fried Oreos.

Rob Huffman lives in Spotsylvania County.