From August 12th through the 15th, the Murray County Fair welcomed visitors and community members for a memorable week of events and gatherings. For me, it was a chance to visit my family in Southwest Minnesota and celebrate my grandparents' 60th wedding anniversary. For others, it was an opportunity to showcase the projects and skills they had worked on all year.
My cousin was among those highlighting their talents - participating in the Beef Show at Olson Arena with Voss Cattle Co. That was reason enough for me to bring my camera along to the fair - here's what I captured!
OLSON ARENA
Home to the 4-H Rabbit, Goat, Sheep, Swine, Dairy, Beef, and Llama/Alpaca Shows, Olson Arena is a special stop at the Murray County Fair. It's a testament to the hours each kid spends working on their showmanship throughout the year. A number of them will go on to represent Murray County at the Minnesota State Fair later in August and into September.
THE COMMUNITY BEHIND THE FAIR
Murray County is farm country in the plain sense of the phrase. Row crops, cattle, grain bins on the skyline, gravel roads laid out on a grid. The fair is essentially the community's annual showcase — the livestock barns, the open class exhibits, the 4-H projects all trace back to operations that run year-round whether anyone's watching or not. Photographing the fair without photographing the countryside around it would be telling half the story.