MURDOCK — With its contests for critters from rabbits to roosters and rides that vary from a Ferris wheel to the infamous Nitro, the 2012 Charlotte County Fair hasn’t changed much since it was started 24 years ago.

And, for that, it deserves a blue ribbon, patrons said Saturday.

“It’s part of keeping the agriculture community alive,” pointed out John Mahshie, a board director of the Charlotte County Fair Association. “We’ve got arts and crafts for the older folks, and grand championships for the kids to show off their animals.”

He also pointed out the association was giving $1,000 scholarships to be awarded to one student from each of the three high schools that entered art and music competitions at the fair.

Located across State Road 776 from Charlotte Sports Park, the fair runs through Feb. 12.

Even some Midwestern
farm folks who have seen some of the best fairs in the country were impressed.

“We’re a farm state, so our fairs are three times as big,” said Mary Dennis of Port Charlotte. “We’ve always got the biggest boar, the biggest cow and the biggest elk. And we have The Butter Lady. She sculpts presidents out of butter.

“But this (Charlotte County Fair) is pretty good compared to ours,” she added. “This is a close second. I’m definitely impressed.”

She was interviewed after touring the livestock barn where judges were examining the animals that Charlotte County 4-H club members had entered.

Dennis had good reason to be impressed. The 4-H had stacked the barn with some 200 cages of animals, nearly twice the number as last year, said Michael Flower of Punta Gorda, director of the Fur & Feathers 4-H Club.

Kayden Turnage, 10, of Punta Gorda, was proud to display a silver belt buckle she won for presenting the grand champion goat. She was asked what that accomplishment means to her.

“It gives me pride in what I do,” she said. “It means I can do anything I want to.”

Raising show animals is no picnic, added 4-H member Dalton Weeks, who won blue ribbons for a Phoenix rooster and hen. “I had to dip ’em, and feed ’em an amount of good food each day,” he said. “We get up real early.”

Asked how it feels to win a blue ribbon, he replied, “It feels relieving.”

For traveling chain saw woodcarvers Chris Lantz, 21, and Michael Koentop, 25, of Oconee, Ga., who were among some two dozen vendors on a concourse, this fair provided the opportunity to kick off their partnership. The two men are cousins who were introduced to the carving as toddlers by Lantz’s father and brothers, who are Koentop’s uncles.

“I was eating sawdust and running my plastic chain saw in my diapers,” said Lantz of his youth.

Meanwhile, teenagers took to rides with names like Tornado and Sea Dragon. Jacqulyne Merry Brennan, 9, however, preferred a tamer one that operated more like an elevator — except its passengers were strapped to the outside.

“When I go down it tickles my stomach,” she said.

Dan and Cecilia Brubeck, Ohioans who winter in Punta Gorda, said this fair was a microcosm of ones they saw in Knox County, Ohio. However, they weren’t disappointed.

“I thought the petting zoo was kind of interesting,” Dan said.

“I wish our grandchildren were here,” Cecilia added.

Email: gmartin@sun-herald.com