Another Arkansas State Fair began Friday, just 10 months after fair officials were forced to go with hat in hand to the state Capitol and ask for what one northwest Arkansas legislator described as a bailout.
Gov. Asa Hutchinson had requested that legislators transfer up to $911,050 in state rainy-day funds for a grant to the fair. During a legislative hearing, state Rep. Jim Dotson of Bentonville asked the state budget administrator if he would "be coming back and asking for a bailout again. We already give close to $1 million annually. This is like doubling what the state is going to give them."
At a second legislative meeting two days later, state Sen. Kim Hammer of Benton told the fair's Doug White that fair officials would "be hard-pressed to come back around next year and expect to get any money."
State Rep. Mary Bentley of Perryville said some of her constituents were "very disturbed."
White sat there and took his verbal beating like a man, just as state department heads, school superintendents and others are so often forced to do when legislators are playing to the cameras. I've watched it hundreds of times through the decades.
I'm having lunch with White months later at Loca Luna in Little Rock, and he's explaining to me the crisis he faced last December after being named the fair's interim president. In June, he became the full-time president and general manager of the Arkansas Livestock Show Association.
White was a fair volunteer for years, then served almost a decade on the board.
"The day of that first legislative hearing was my first full day as the interim director," he tells me. "It wasn't fun. And the fact is that we did have a bad fair from a financial standpoint last fall. We had an 11-day fair, and there was rain on six of those days."
Ralph Shoptaw, who had been the president and general manager for more than 13 years, retired in December at age 71.
The 2018 Arkansas State Fair lost more than $600,000. White, who had been the secretary-treasurer of the board, took on the role of bad cop. Full-time positions were eliminated. Concessions, which had been handled by an outside contractor, was moved back in-house. Nonprofit groups were recruited to help provide maintenance on the grounds.
"We must maintain 20 buildings on 140 acres," White says. "Our newest building is 38 years old. There are a lot of maintenance costs. It was foolhardy of us to rely so heavily on just the fair. We need events all year that produce a profit.
"I can tell you that every event we've hosted since Jan. 1 has been profitable. The finances are the best they've been in at least 15 years. Events such as the Big Buck Classic, flower and garden shows and gun shows have been a success. We can offer lots of free parking, and it's all secure within a fenced area. Others can't offer that. We just have to do a better job of selling ourselves."
There's no bigger fan of the Arkansas State Fair than White, an Oklahoma native who obtained a journalism degree from the University of Oklahoma before working for rural electric cooperatives. White came to Arkansas to work for the Arkansas Electric Cooperative Corp. and in the process gained a deep understanding of rural Arkansas. He has coordinated closely in recent months with employees of the Old State House on an exhibit that celebrates 80 years of the Arkansas State Fair. The exhibit, titled "80 Blue Ribbon Years: Cotton to Cattle," will run through next spring.
White hopes to eventually have an online database of historic materials along with exhibits in Barton Coliseum that detail the rich history of the fairgrounds. He also wants a historic marker placed at the helicopter pad that was built for President John F. Kennedy's visit to the fairgrounds in October 1963.
"Your delegation in the Congress is unusually distinguished," Kennedy said that day. "As a team, they work together for Arkansas and the country. As individuals, every member plays an important role. For example, Jim Trimble is a key member of the all-important House Rules Committee, and Took Gathings speaks for Arkansas and the United States in the House Committee on Agriculture. And every American who reads a paper or watches television is aware of the determined fight against national crime and corruption being led by your senior senator, John McClellan."
Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas the following month.
"The original mission of the fair isn't lost on me," White says. "I love the things happening in the urban areas of our state, but we're still an agricultural state at heart. We need to celebrate that. We've expanded our livestock exhibits so there are more poultry and rabbits. People come to Little Rock from the rural areas, and they make memories to last a lifetime. There are still memories to be had at the Arkansas State Fair."
When I was growing up in Arkadelphia, my parents would bring me to the fair each year. We would attend the rodeo (which White has eliminated since it was losing money) and enjoy the featured entertainer. I can remember seeing singers ranging from Roger Miller to Frank Sinatra Jr. I also remember eating corndogs and cotton candy and sleeping in the back of the Oldsmobile as we rolled home late at night.
The Arkansas State Agricultural and Mechanical Association was formed in November 1867, and one of its missions was to hold a fair. The first such event took place from Nov. 17-20, 1868. The fair was held until 1876 at the corner of Center and 17th streets in Little Rock before moving to Arch Street.
The State Fair Association of Arkansas was incorporated in May 1881 and used a 110-acre site on East Ninth Street in Little Rock for a fair until the start of World War I. Events billed as state fairs also were held in Hot Springs beginning in 1906.
"Arkansas was still feeling the effects of the Depression well into the 1930s," Dennis Schick, former director of the Arkansas Press Association, writes in a history of the event. "The economy was in disarray, and the primary cash crop of the state--cotton--was in decline. In 1937, a survey by the University of Arkansas Cooperative Extension Service revealed that livestock would be successful in the state. A group of leaders, who later formed the Arkansas Livestock Show Association, decided to hold a livestock exposition to educate farmers and to promote the industry.
"The first Arkansas Livestock Show--later changed to the Arkansas State Fair and Livestock Show--was held Nov. 9-13, 1938, in North Little Rock at Fifth and Smothers. Only 17,000 people attended, and the show lost $23,000. In 1939, the fair and show were moved back a month to mid-October for better weather. In addition to the time change, fair promoters brought in their first celebrity, a young movie star named Roy Rogers. The move worked, leading to celebrities being featured every year since, among them being Western stars such as Gene Autry and musicians such as Johnny Cash. The Arkansas State Fair continued in North Little Rock for three more years."
A massive fire the day after the 1942 fair destroyed the North Little Rock fairgrounds. A fair was held in Pine Bluff in 1943, and the event was canceled in 1944-45. In 1945, the Little Rock Chamber of Commerce offered land along Roosevelt Road as a home for the fair. It has been there ever since, though the grounds have grown considerably through the decades.
For the next week, thousands of more Arkansans will make memories at that location. I join White in believing that the state's money was well spent. The Arkansas State Fair is a tradition worth keeping.
------------v------------
Rex Nelson is a senior editor at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Editorial on 10/13/2019