Fair returns to Malone, crowds fill midway

Locals and visitors took advantage of the sunny weekend weather packing the fairgrounds opening weekend to enjoy fair food and amusement rides.

According to Dave Gokey, vice president of the Franklin County Agricultural Society, it is nice to see all the hard work that goes into putting on the fair every year pay off once the crowds arrive.

“It’s kind of nice to see the people walking the grounds, there’s 11 fair directors and we all work pretty hard to get this fair up and running,” Gokey said, “It’s not just fair week it’s a couple months before when we do the physical work, but all year long we plan events, a lot of planning goes into it.”

Gokey said the free gate admission and free parking for the fair’s first couple of days is something the county fair started to offer a couple years ago. “The past couple of years, since we cut it back, really, to an eight day fair we allow the carnival to come in and they open,” he said, “It kind of gives the local people a little break on the gates, the food vendors, as you can see are open, it’s been the last two years that we have done that.”

The fair’s first official day is Sunday, according to Gokey, who said tractor and truck pulls are the first events by the grandstand.

“We officially open the fair on Sunday morning at 8, the gates will be manned, our office staff and our people will be on site,” he said, “Sunday morning at 9 we have the River Valley Antique pullers, around noontime New York Hot Farm does their pull and then the Franklin County Ag Society tractor pull is in there and then it’s the truck pull.”

Gokey said a new amusement ride at this year’s fair is bumper cars.

“We haven’t had the bumper cars here with the carnival in a few years, they’re back, I see kids walking around that bumper car area and they are excited to get in there,” he said.

According to Gokey, the Black Cat Hell Drivers will be back performing in front of the grandstand crowd, Wednesday at 7 p.m.

“We used to have them every year, they have been around for 50 or 60 years, some of them have kind of aged out and the last time we had them here was 2019,” he said, “It’s been four years since we have had them, there’s a lot of enthusiasm, people are excited about seeing them again.”

Gokey said fair facilities were upgraded over the summer, with the cattle barn getting a new cement floor.

“Anybody who comes to the fair needs to walk through our new cattle barn, we poured a couple hundred yards of cement, we redid the barn and the floors so now you can walk through it, it’s really smooth, it was a nice job,” Gokey said, “We have a new show ring in the indoor arena, which is now our cattle barn and show ring.”

Gokey said 4-H horse shows started on Monday, at the riding area, which was new the fairgrounds last year.

“We have cattle shows throughout the week, horse shows throughout the week, 4-H goat shows, open goat shows, 4-H sheep, open sheep, open horse shows too,” Gokey said.

This year’s concerts will be on Thursday and Saturday evenings, according to Gokey, who said Bailey Zimmerman and Nate Smith are performing Thursday and Melissa Etheridge will take the stage on Saturday.

Gokey said he is looking forward to fair week, adding he appreciates all the work that his fellow directors put into the annual fair.

“At the end of the day just the camaraderie between the directors, everybody steps up and everybody puts their best foot forward and we pull it all together, and have a really good fair,” Gokey said.