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PHOTOS COURTESY PIERCE COUNTY FAIR

COUNTRY LIFE. This year’s Pierce County Fair, in Graham, will be held Aug. 7-10. It will feature rides and games, fair food, animals, competitions, entertainment and more.

A little bit of country at the Pierce County Fair

By Meghan Erkkinen

Nothing is more country this summer than the Pierce County Fair. This year’s event, to be held Aug. 7-10, will feature fair favorites for country and city folks alike – including carnival rides, animals, pie contests, even a children’s tractor pull.

The more than 60-year-old fair is continuing its tradition of bringing families out to experience a weekend of agriculture, arts and crafts, animals, arts and entertainment. The fair, at Graham’s Frontier Park on Meridian, usually draws about 24,000 visitors, and this year, fair organizers are hoping for even more.

“It’s a wonderful local event and it doesn’t cost a lot of gas money to get here,” said the fair’s office supervisor Beth Rossow, who has worked at the fair for more than 30 years. “It’s a very low-cost event.”

In fact, fair organizers are really trying to get the word out about the cost of the event. In comparing the price of attending the fair to the price of other local attractions – Northwest Trek, the Tacoma Art Museum and the Puyallup Spring Fair, for example – fair organizers showed that the event is truly of lower cost in comparison. Admission and parking for a family of four is $19.

“It’s Pierce County’s best entertainment value,” Rossow said. “We do try to cater more to a family experience. It’s not quite as commercially oriented. We have a lot of things you can do for free.”

The event will include a variety of rides and games for younger children as well as teens and adults. Two entertainment stages will be set up at the event, one featuring a continuous stream of country groups and performers, and another featuring a variety of music.

The event will also feature livestock exhibitions and events through 4H and other competitions for children. For adults, there will be contests for quilting, baking, photography, arts and crafts, canning and gardening. Usually, in all of the competition categories, the fair receives about 8,000 entries – plenty to fill the location’s exhibition halls.

The Sardis Raptor Center will hold daily exhibitions, displaying many birds of prey and educating audiences on each of the animals.

The Wenatchee Youth Circus will also perform daily. The acrobats are aged 3 to 18 and perform all sorts of circus tricks, except those with wild animals. The troupe has an average membership of 45 to 65 children and averages 12,000 miles a year in travel.

The Toddler Games Driving School is a fun, interactive attraction for children ages 1 to 5 and their parents. Parents serve as the official driving coaches as their toddlers scoot around in luxury sports coups, classy cruisers, tractors and motorcycles. Events and registration for this event begins at 10 a.m. daily.

The fair takes place Aug. 7-10 at Frontier Park, located at 21718 Meridian Ave. E. in Graham. The fair is open daily from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. except on Aug. 10, when it will close at 6 p.m. Admission is $5 for adults, $3 for children ages 6-17, $3 for seniors and free for children 5 and under. Parking is $5.

For more information on the fair, competitions or the lineup of events, call (253) 847-4754 or visit www.piercecountyfair.com.

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