From building to barn, Chelan County Fair offers a glimpse into country living

Wyatt Kooy, an 11-year-old from the Appleatchee 4-H Club, is eager to tell onlookers about his horse Bob, and even to let them feed Bob a treat or two.

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Norah Bouquay Maisonnave, a sixth-grader from Manson, shows off her Italian Carniolan bees, which are easy to handle for a first-year beekeeper like her and make great honey.

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Amazingly, there’s no one guarding the eggs at this year’s fair, or even this year’s biggest pumpkin, grown by Allan Kaas.

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The Best in Show produce display has something from every category, including an impressive beet and a sunflower head the size of a car tire — without its petals!

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Flowers, fruits, nuts and honey decorate this “Mad About the Fair”-themed entry from the Manson Grange.

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A full table of blue-ribbon bouquets lines one entire wall of the horticulture building.

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Fresh honey from all over the region had fairgoers wishing that those were price tags instead of name tags on the jars.

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This winner from a previous winner was just along to stand guard over this year’s knit entries.

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Art is judged not just by quality, but by skill level, so it isn’t just older kids that win, but even kids who simply excel for what is expected at their age level.

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Posted Monday, September 8, 2025 4:31 pm

By ANDREW SIMPSON
Ward Media Staff Reporter

CASHMERE — At the 73rd annual Chelan County Fair, a visitor could expect to see a lot of the same features, attractions, rides and food. That’s just the nature of a county fair. But out in Cashmere, if you keep attending across the years, you begin to see the patterns expanding.

Kids come back with the same horse, older, better versed in the way they train their animal, more confident. You notice last names repeating with different first names across disciplines in the fair schedule: Big sister shows a goat while little brother gets ready in the swine barn. You recognize names from when you were young; parents who showed animals at the fair years ago have kids who are doing it today.

It’s a family affair, sure, and multiple kids from the same family are likelier than not to do similar things. But more than that, it’s a culture. The fair and everything it includes are a way of life. That is to say, these kids aren’t just raising a sheep to win a ribbon — they raise it because their family raises sheep.

Put another way, you don’t grow a pumpkin the size of a Fiat 500 because it seemed like fun at the time. You don’t compile generations of recipes into a cookbook and then make seven different pies to compete with at the fair because you reckon they taste good. You do it because your neighbors have been tasting that same pie since your grandma first made it. You do it because the orchard on the property next door has been giving your family apples since you were young.

And it’s not just food and animals — prize-winning dahlias dot the outbuildings because your great aunt gifted you some dinnerplate tubers last year from her winning entries. Two-headed pears and giant sunflowers, hand-knit dragon body pillows, paintings from people of all ages, beautiful lapidary displays and even a beekeeper on hand over by all the honey on display.

The pride you can feel in the air at the Chelan County Fair isn’t the boasting of blue ribbons. It’s the sheer joy of showing up with a community of farmers, ranchers, bakers, riders, artists, friends and family, and doing all the things you know how to do best.

Andrew Simpson: 509-433-7626 or andrew@ward.media