Faulkner County Fair to kick off Tuesday with parade

CONWAY — Faulkner County will usher in its 76th annual county fair Tuesday with a parade that will wind through downtown Conway beginning at 5 p.m.

Following the parade, the fair will officially get underway Tuesday night at the Conway Expo Center and Fairgrounds, 2501 E. Oak St. The annual fair will include concessions, entertainment and a variety of livestock and commercial exhibits, as well as arts and crafts, baked goods, needlecraft, agronomy and horticulture exhibits.

Admission to the fair is free, but parking is $5 per car.

Some judging took place Friday and Monday, including home-economics items and a dairy-goat show, but more judging will continue Tuesday through Thursday. Exhibit buildings will open at 9 a.m. Wednesday through Saturday. The fair will conclude at midnight Saturday.

The theme for this year’s parade is “A Reason to Smile.”

David Henze, general chairman of the Faulkner County Fair Association, said the parade will honor the late Becky Harris, a Conway newspaper reporter and longtime supporter of community events, and the late Ed Hammontree, who served as auctioneer for the fair’s junior livestock auction for many years. Members of the Harris and Hammontree families will serve as the parade’s grand marshals.

Swyear Amusements of Illinois and Florida will provide the midway attractions, which will open at 6 p.m. Tuesday through Friday and at noon Saturday.

Entertainment will be presented at 8 p.m. Friday at the bandstand and will feature acts from Nashville, Tennessee.

Kayla Adams and SaraBeth Swagerty will perform individually and together on Friday night.

Adams, who is originally from Kalispell, Montana, is a country singer/guitarist whose debut single is “Sober & Sorry.”

Swagerty, originally from Dallas, Texas, is a contemporary country singer/songwriter whose debut album is Anything Is Possible. Her second album, Obsessive, was released in August.

Mammoth Spring native Matthew Huff will present Saturday night’s entertainment.

Huff, who is a graduate of the University of Central Arkansas and taught elementary school in Conway for a few years, is a country singer/songwriter and has been nominated for several awards by the International Music and Entertainment Association Inc. Those nominations include Country Entertainer of the Year, Country Male Artist of the Year, Country Single of the Year for “A Little Bit of Crown” and Country Album of the Year for Give It All I Got.

Henze said this year’s fair will feature two new exhibits from the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.

“We usually have the medium-sized fish aquarium, but this year we will have the large aquarium,” Henze said. This aquarium, which holds 3,000 gallons of water, will feature a large variety of native fish species and aquatic turtles. The exhibit will be on display Thursday, Friday and Saturday.

“We will also have the Scales of Justice exhibit,” Henze said, adding that it will be on display during the entire run of the fair. “This exhibit debuted at last year’s

Arkansas State Fair, where I first saw it. I think we are among the first county fairs to have it on display.

“It shows examples of animals that have been poached, as well as illegal apparatuses that are used by some hunters. It also provides information on how to become a wildlife officer and what the duties of that job entail.”

Keith Stephens, assistant chief of communications for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission, also talked about the exhibit.

“The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission began an innovative Scales of Justice program in 2013 to increase awareness and appreciation of the enforcement division and what a wildlife officer’s role is in The Natural State,” Stephens said. “The Scales of Justice Trailer is available free of charge for display at qualifying community events, such as fairs or festivals, outdoor shows and Arkansas Game and Fish Commission-sponsored events.”

The Arkansas Arts Center’s Artmobile, which will also be on display at the county fair, features works from the Arts Center’s permanent collection.

Henze said Friday will be an “activity day” for children from day care centers and elementary schools throughout the county. The day will feature a mobile dairy, where “children can see how a cow is milked and where milk cones from,” Henze said.

Friday’s activities will also include a dog-obedience exhibition, followed by a dog show that will feature “kids who have signed up to show their dogs,” Henze said.

The midway rides will not be open Friday morning.

“This is just an educational day,” Henze said.

Saturday’s activities will include the junior livestock auction at 10 a.m. and a livestock special awards ceremony at 2 p.m.

Henze said there will also be an ATV safety booth presented by the Injury Prevention Program at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences and Arkansas Children’s Hospital.

“We will have a variety of commercial booths/exhibits, along with the usual political booths,” Henze said.

“We will also have a raffle this year to benefit the Fair Board Scholarship that we started offering last year,” Henze said. “We will raffle off a 50-inch flat-screen TV. Each ticket is $1 or six tickets for $5. All proceeds will go to the scholarship fund.”

Henze said the scholarship is given to a Faulkner County graduating high school senior who has exhibited at the fair — animals, crafts, baked goods, canned goods, photographs, etc. It is a one-year $1,500 scholarship — $750 for each semester of the student’s first year.

For more information on the Faulkner County Fair, visit www.faulknerfairparade.net.

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