Category: Press Releases

(6-13-19) Fair Improvements

PRESS RELEASE – June 13, 2019

Wilson County Fair, Lebanon, TN

Everyone is busy getting ready for the 2019 Wilson County Fair.Mark your calendars for August 16-24.Gates will open on Friday, August 16 at 5:00 p.m.

Thanks to Ford and the Middle Tennessee Ford Dealers for again being the presenting sponsor of the 2019 Wilson County Fair.Ford has been the presenting sponsor for many years and we appreciate all they do.

The Wilson County Fair will be “A Grand Celebration!” with many improvements being made throughout the Fairgrounds. The Turner Evans building and the Pop Smartt Barn as well as the former Poultry and Rabbit barn will be barn red at Fair time.

The former Poultry and Rabbit barn will be the Ag Venture Barn and the Pop Smartt Barn will be the new home for our rabbit and poultry shows. The Ag Venture Barn is also being refreshed with new educational agricultural exhibits that include many interactive activities as well as an inflatable corn maze, dairy parlor, ag simulator and more. Thanks to Wilson County Farm Bureau for helping to sponsor the revitalization of this educational area.

Additions are also being made to our newest barn, the Heritage Barn. More antique tools and equipment are being displayed on the walls covered with barn wood and tin. The upstairs area truly depicts a homestead area from days gone by. Kitchen and bedroom areas are two of the highlights in the loft of the barn.

When you go to the Fair this year, you will see new white fencing, a newly paved midway area, a new road in Kiddie Land and paved road for the livestock entrance and perimeter road.New lighting is being added in the Farm Equipment area, Fiddlers Grove, Kiddie Land and the Mutton Busting area.

Fiber optic cabling has been installed to the Livestock Campus. This enhanced technology will support our live streaming of animal births in the Birthing Area. Viewers from around the world can join our Fair on-line to learn more about horses, pigs, goats, cattle and sheep.

We are excited and looking forward to everyone’s visit.There is going to be so much to see and do that there is no way to see everything in one visit.We know this is going to be a great Fair and we hope you are making plans to attend!

Hope to see you August 16!

For more information visit www.wilsoncountyfair.net or call 615-443-2626.

Premier Fair at Tennessee Association of Fairs

Wilson County Fair Wins Premier Fair at Tennessee Association of Fairs

The Wilson County Fair continued its winning ways at this year’s Tennessee Association of Fairs (TAF) Convention, bringing home the Premier Fair Award in the AAA Division for the 2018 Fair.

Wilson County also garnered with six 1st place awards and the Golden Needle Award in the Showcase of Fairs Competitive Exhibits, as well as several 2nd and 3rd place awards.

2018 Fairest of the Fair Addison Grace Oakley competed with other young ladies representing fairs across the state of Tennessee, placing in the Top 10.

“We were very pleased this year,” Helen McPeak, Wilson County Fair Executive Director, said of the awards received. “Addison did a wonderful job and represented Wilson County with grace and was a true ambassador for Wilson County.”

McPeak added, “The Fair is all about agriculture, fun and putting smiles on people’s faces. We have over 1,000 volunteers who contribute to making that happen at the Wilson County Fair, and it truly is a showcase of our community. It’s the one time that everybody in our county comes together.”

Wilson County’s fair is also ranked No. 30 on the Top 50 Fairs in the Nation listing compiled by carnivalwarehouse.com, and Reithoffer Shows, which provides the midway rides, is ranked No. 5 in the nation by the same organization.

First place awards in the Showcase included the digital scrapbook; pieced quilt – machine pieced/machine quilted; pieced quilt – hand pieced/machine quilted; free standing fair display; table top fair display; and Power Point. The hand pieced/machined quilted quilt, entered by Joyce Robinson, won the top quilting award – the Golden Needle.

Second place was received for the fair poster, Pick TN Products exhibit and Best Fair Theme Display. Third place was garnered for the Premium Book (Fair Catalog) in the AAA/Regional Division, AAA Division scrapbook and for video.

Premier Fair is presented in three categories: Division A for counties with a population under 21,000; AA Division for counties with a population of 21,000 to 47,000, and AAA Division for fairs in counties with a population of over 47,000.

Trousdale County won Premier Fair in Division A while Rhea County won in Division AA.

Wilson County will also be represented on the TAF Board of Directors with McPeak being elected to serve as a Middle Tennessee director for a three-year term.

WCF Honors Dairy Farmers

LEBANON, TENN – The 2018 Wilson County Fair will be honoring our dairy farms and families as we celebrate “Year of Milk” as the agriculture commodity and making more mAGic memories.

 

Thanks goes out to Daniel Pelletier for creating the metal Milk Carton that is located at The Fairgrounds entrance.

A life of early mornings, long days of hard work and braving the elements day in and day out 365 days a year may not sound appealing to everyone, but for Wilson County’s dairy farmers, this is the lifestyle they have happily chosen.
mAGic Memories are abundant on a dairy farm. Looking out over the farm, raising children and grandchildren to experience morning and afternoon milking, bottle feeding baby calves, harvesting crops, baling hay – the many chores involved with stewardship of the land and cattle bring families closer together.

 

“Watching three little boys grow up and have the whole farm experience: playing in the creek, showing calves, seeing the natural life and death experience and growing up to be good people” are the mAGic Memories for Roy Major, patriarch of Major Dairy Farm, where he and wife, Diane, raised sons Josh, Seth and Jared. Grandchildren Carter and Addison are now experiencing that same mAGic. Major Dairy Farm was established in 1979.

 

“It’s a good way of life,” echoes Larry Eastes of Eastes Dairy Farm. “A dairy farm is a good place to raise a family, to get to be with them every day and see them grow.”
Eastes’s farm will reach Century Farm status in 2019 – with 100 years of continuous dairy operation. Established by his grandparents, Ernest and Allie Driver, the farm was then operated by his parents John D. and Ernestine Eastes before Larry took the reins. His son, Kirk, helps daily on the farm, while daughter Lora Eastes Stutts is a 5th grade teacher in Watertown. Both live on the farm with their own families, and Larry’s grandchildren are growing up steeped in farm life just as their parents were.

 

Brothers Jeffrey, Justin and Jason Turner grew up milking cows, and Jeffrey and Justin decided to open their own dairy on the family farm, milking their first Holsteins on December 9, 2015. Their parents, Tommy and Jackie Turner, got out of the dairy business in the early 2000’s, but Jeffrey has fond memories of going to the barn with his dad to milk, or when he was too small to help, waiting for his dad to come in from milking so the family could sit down together for the evening meal. It’s all about family. And even though Jason isn’t a partner in the new dairy, he helps out too.

 

Holsteins are the predominant dairy breed in Wilson County, with the Turners having 100% Holsteins; the Eastes family having about 80 percent Holstein plus Jersey and a few Brown Swiss; and Major Dairy Farm having 95 percent registered Holstein, plus a few Brown Swiss, Ayrshire and Jerseys – from acquiring additional breeds for the youngsters to show through 4-H. Eastes milks about 80 a day, the Turners about 100 and the Majors average 200 to 220. That translates to tons of milk in a year: 8 to 8.5 million pounds of milk annually, combined.

 

While dairy farming is a beloved way of life, it’s one that today is more challenging than ever before. Volatile markets and only one buyer for the area leave these hard working families at the mercy of whatever price they are given. Margins are slim to negative. Giant corporate dairy farms that load out full tankers of milk daily are tough for these family farms to compete against. Prohibitively high land costs make expansion pretty much impossible. But these dairy farmers are accustomed to adversity and do their best to survive and thrive.

 

Roy Major hopes to see market corrections bring some stability in the future so his farm can continue to provide the dairy farming opportunity for his grandchildren. The Eastes family already has diversified by building up their herd of beef cattle. Larry’s dream is to at least keep operating the dairy through the 100- year anniversary in 2019, but without market changes, they may transition completely to beef. As the youngest dairy farm in Wilson County, the Turner Dairy Farm would like to expand and is exploring options to eliminate the market volatility they face today.

 

Through it all, they pull together as strong families rooted to the land and cattle they care so deeply for, making more mAGic memories as the days pass by.