COVID-19 claims county fair
By Neal A. Shipman
Farmer Editor
For 61 years, the McKenzie County Fair has welcomed county residents during some pretty tumultuous times. It’s been held when the country was at war, the county was being ravaged by droughts and low agriculture prices, and through the ups and downs of the oil industry.
But come this June, there will not be a 62nd annual McKenzie County Fair due to concerns of COVID-19. And of course that means the McKenzie County 4-Hers are not going to be scurrying around the fairgrounds showing their livestock and all the projects that they have been working on all year. And with no fair this year, that means that the thousands of area residents who annually have filled the fairgrounds to ride carnival rides or take in the demolition derby and the NDRA rodeo are going to have to find some other form of entertainment.
“It wasn’t an easy decision to make,” states Tim Nelson, McKenzie County Fair Board president following the board’s decision on Monday, May 4. “We work all year to have a fair. It wasn’t something that we wanted to let go.”