Fair board setting rodeo, working on improving carnival for 2014

The Great Northern Fair Board is moving forward with plans for the next Hill County fair, including an update on the carnival — with which many were disappointed last summer — and bringing back the local association to put on the rodeo, as well as finalizing the nighttime entertainment and selecting new free stage entertainers.

Fairgrounds manager Tim Solomon said Tuesday during the board’s monthly meeting that he met with the owner of Brown’s Amusement during the annual fair convention in Billings this month. They talked about the carnival, and the carnival owner said he was working to bring some different rides, Solomon said.

Fairgoers complained about the rides in 2013, mainly that the attractions did not include taller, more spectacular rides such as the Zipper.

Solomon said the company, hired on a three-year contract starting in 2013 to replace the previous carnival, met all of its contractual obligations, but did not have rides many people were looking for.

Solomon said Brown told him in Billings that he is working to bring some taller rides, including the Zipper, when he comes back to Montana in 2014.

“To make a long story short, he said they’d do everything they can to change that,” Solomon told the board.

Brown’s tour in 2013 was its first in Montana. The Great Northern Fair Board hired it to replace Royal West Amusement when that company could no longer guarantee, after the 2012 fair, that it could bring enough rides to fulfill its contract.

The board also heard an update on the rodeo, with Solomon saying he and board members met with the local association that put on the last three rodeos at the Great Northern Fair and updated its contract.

Board member Gus Sharp, who volunteered in October to act as the fair board’s liaison with the rodeo association, said he will meet with association members this week to have them sign the contract.

Association members said at the board’s July meeting, after the fair, that they would no longer put on the rodeo.

Last month, a representative said they would again, mainly due to community support for the association putting on its highly praised rodeo and Sharp meeting with them to see if they would resume,

The board also approved bringing back pig wrestling as a nighttime show to take the Wednesday slot.

That event, which has been increasingly popular at the Blaine County Fair for several years, first appeared at the Great Northern Fair last summer.

Solomon said his only concern is finding enough workers to run the pig wrestling. The organizers require the fair to provide people to help with setting up and tearing down the event, washing off the contestants and pigs and announcing the event.

Solomon said enough people helped in 2013, but it was difficult putting the work together in time for the fair.

The board also approved the two acts Solomon and board member Missy Boucher, who also attended the convention in Billings this month, recommended for the free stage, the escape artist Kristen Johnson — Lady Houdini — and entertainers Washboard Willy and Lloyd Mabrey.

Solomon said the escape artist would put on three shows a day, ranging from escaping from straight jackets while suspended upside down above the stage to escaping from handcuffs, chains and shackles while underwater in a clear, glass tank.

Boucher said Johnson had a video showing her performance, which are about 25-30 minutes long each.

“They had them on the edge of their seats every program,” Boucher said.

Johnson in 2012 broke escape artist Harry Houdini’s record for “water torture cell” escapes.

Solomon said Washboard Willy would both walk around the midway entertaining while also performing on stage with Lloyd Mabrey. The duo is billed as providing “audience interaction, comedy and music for all generations.”

Solomon said Johnson costs $1,700 a day — he said he originally thought the show would be much higher and out of the Great Northern Fair’s price range — and Washboard Willy and Mabrey would charge the Havre fair $1,600 a day. Solomon said that is about average for the acts the Great Northern Fair has hired in recent years.