Wilbur was a pig. I hunted for him at the big Arizona State Fair in Phoenix and at the smaller, sweeter Coconino County Fair. The State Fair was held in October of each year, across the vacant lot from my grandparents’ house at McDowell and 19th Avenue at the State fairgrounds. My sisters and I waited each year for the fall night that the semis would begin rolling in. Workers unloaded what looked like ordinary machinery from the trucks. That machinery became magic vessels of fantasy and awe, capable of taking us kids from the asphalt of the fairgrounds lot to a magic world. Each night for a month blazing rainbow lights and blaring loudspeakers, shattered the quiet.
Over the years the Coconino County Fair has won first prize for my sisters’ and my affections and attendance. Reverence for the fair runs in our family. My mother, Starr and my great grandmother, Dellah, won so many ribbons at the Coconino County and Arizona State Fairs that they filled an old shoe box. The pile of bright rainbow-colored ribbons was enough to craft a quilt. First Place was blue; Second Place red; Third Place white. And then there were the pink ones for Honorable Mention and green for just showing up with something. That was over 50 years ago. Now I enter contests with my granddaughter – and we win.
While Starr and Dellah won mostly for their beautifully baked light cakes, piquant watermelon pickles and gem-glowing fruit jams, these days I walk into the old county fairgrounds with baskets of strongly scented fresh herbs, hefty veggies and bright flowers. All this abundance has been freshly harvested from cottage gardens and new greenhouses out at the old family land on Lake Mary Road. My grand-babes have been attending the fair since they were in diapers, now it is my 6 year-old granddaughter, Olivia Starr who has her own ribbon collection. Each summer she waits anxiously for the day we go to the old exhibit barns at the Fair, to find our entries and count up our ribbons. This year she has her hopes for winning that that elusive Best of Show Ribbon and cash prize. Her deep blue eyes widen with excitement as she says, “I want that ginormous ruffled purple one, Gramma.” Olivia has chosen her surefire winners of Starr’s Poundcake, Gingerbread Pear Up-side Down Cake, Pumpkin Muffins and Rose Jelly as the top contenders for prizes this year. (Recipes for these family favorites are contained here in our little Back Roads book).
When I think of my journeys to the fair, I remember thinking the ads that claimed “all roads lead to the fair” as kind of fanciful, kinda true. Then I am struck by the crazy fact that I have never been to a fair, State or County were there was not a “Wilbur” the pig. It is as if each year in uncanny continuity from the last, there is another big pink Wilbur the pig at the fair. Having loved the E. B. White heartbreaker “Charlotte’s Web” as a child (and of course reading it to my grand-babes), I am touched by the friendship between the young girl, the pig and the spider in the barn. I still look forward every year to the walk into the pig barn and seeing Wilbur. He is always there. I love checking out who this year’s Wilbur is flanked by. Last year it was more giant hogs with names like “honest bacon” and “world’s best ham” and my favorite “El Chunko”. I imagine the sweet faces of the young 4H kids and the sweet baby pigs making their first acquaintance with each other and the thought process that brings these seemingly inappropriate names forth. I imagine at the naming of their charges the young 4Hers don’t realize the feelings they will have after months of caretaking, grooming and ultimately bonding to what once was a cute, cuddly piglet, now fully grown into a formidable animal. How is it to spend so much time with an animal that you know will be auctioned off to another family?
On our journey through this year’s Fair we leave Wilbur, for of course he is here again this year and wander towards another favorite barn. The floral barn. Same deal really, humans consciously raising another life form from infancy, in this case seeds, to adulthood. The growers don’t name their flowers; the names were already given to all the plant’s ancestors. I wonder what names these caregivers would give their charges? What they feel as they harvest the beautiful flowers to put on display. The shelves in all of the exhibit barns less full than they were when I was a girl. Less competition. How many ribbons have we won this year?
It almost seems like the beloved trips to and putting our own entries into the Fair are a nostalgic extension of life out here on Lake Mary Road. We now raise Kune Kune pigs of New Zealand decent. They are cute ruffled pigs with turned up snouts that love their bellies scratched and are so people friendly. Living alongside with Muscovy ducks from Bolivia, with their bright iridescent feathers and fly eating duties to the mess of chickens, chicks and one bright feathered protective rooster. These days my garden veggies are lazing in the sun overflowing discarded nursery planters spray painted the colors of the meadow. Easier for my grandma knees and back and safe from the pesky gophers. The thyme and mint from my grandmother’s garden days are still growing here and win lots of ribbons, along with the cottage garden favorites of sweet peas, pansies, snap dragons and clematis. Under the eaves of the old blue railroad house is a horseradish plant grown from the chunk of root that came over to America from Croatia in great grandma Francesca Radosevich’s apron pocket. Alas, I still haven’t gotten a rose to grow with the intense cold we have here. This summer there were 3 hard freezes in June of all things, taking out the veggie garden 3 times. As I write this, I am singing songs to the plants and Olivia is coaxing the squash to get busy growing so we will have specimens perfect enough for our winning fair entries.
At the 2023 Coconino County Fair Starr’s Sour Cream Poundcake won First Prize for cakes and the Whole Orange Sunshine cake/muffins one the big blue ribbon for the King Arthur Baking Contest. Wow! Olivia won her ginormous Best of Show ruffled ribbon for sweet peas. Just an FYI if you enter 5 items in a category at the Fair you get a free ticket to the magic of a pretty old-fashioned county fair, the Coconino County Fair. Held over Labor Day weekend every year at the Coconino County Fairgrounds. Hope you win a ribbon! Everyone at our house is excited and already looking forward to participating again next year.
From the Second Edition of “Back Roads, Scary Critters and What’s for Dinner” by Jodi Johnson to be published by backroadspublishing.com this fall.
