Fair eyes its future

County looking at options outside of city with fairground improvements

MOSES LAKE — The phone's ringing in Al Holman's office. Again.

In the days before the Grant County Fair, that's usually a common occurrence, noted the fair and facility manager of the Grant County Fairgrounds.

The theme for the 2005 Grant County Fair, which kicks off Tuesday and runs through Saturday, is "Trails to the Future."

Holman explained that the fair board was thinking about the anniversary of Lewis and Clark and the Journey of the Corps of Discovery, and wanted to tie in the fair's theme, selected in September 2004.

"This particular fair board does a great job in providing for our community a wonderful, traditional county fair that does look to the future," he said. "If you look at the Blood and Guts exhibit from the Pacific Science Center, that's not the kind of touring exhibit that you could have gotten 10 or 15 years ago."

Holman said that preparations at the fairground have been normal. For the days counting up to the fair, fairgrounds staff has been throwing water on the grass and trees.

"They'll take a nice 10-day break from water," Holman said wryly. "The grass always looks great the day before people load in, and it always looks thrashed the day after people load out. It's just the nature of usage."

Holman said that Grant County has authorized an engineering study for improvements to the fairgrounds, as part of the master plan to make it a year-round facility.

"Because of what's happening with the city and the county in their particular negotiations, obviously it's prudent to look at secondary alternatives," Holman said. The county would like city sewer service, but the city says it won't provide that without annexation, part of city policy. "Although in my mind and many's minds, the best solution is to get with the city and county together on an agreement that works for both parties. But if that doesn't work, it would be unfortunate at other alternatives. So we're in the process of doing that."

This year's fair is the first with bathrooms located in the Kenny Ardell Pavilion, which were part of improvement efforts and installed earlier this year.

"It'll be a nice change for people that are attending activities, everything from the livestock sale to the horse activities to the FFA livestock judging on Saturday morning, to have the restrooms there and handy, and the concession booth there, because we haven't had food in that area also," Holman said.

There are 11 female stalls in the women's restroom, and four urinals and three sit-down toilets in the men's.

Holman said there have been other small changes, but that's usual for the fair. This year, the fairgrounds have redone wooden displays for the agriculture building, he added.

The fair also includes the demolition derby, the rodeo, the aforementioned Blood and Guts exhibit, the return of the Jest in Time Circus of Fools, the Kid's Pedal Power Tractor Pull and headliner Freddy Fender.

"I worked with a lot of entertainers for a lot of years before I came to the job here," Holman noted. "Freddy's real easy to work with. Freddy's one of those good entertainers that, they have needs and that's understandable, but there's nothing wacko."

Fender's needs include towels for the heat, water and a meal, Holman said.

Davis Shows Northwest Carnival also returns with its kiddie carnival and main carnival. Holman praised the carnival for maintaining their prices in the face of high diesel prices.

"If you look at where diesel was a year ago, and where diesel is now, and the carnival running through thousands of gallons a day during the fair, they've done a great job keeping the price down," he said.

Holman also thanked "the literally hundreds" of volunteers who come out to work during the fair and pay admission.

Holman anticipates that 70,000 people, primarily from within the Columbia Basin geographic area, will attend the fair.

"It's the largest family event in the Columbia Basin," Holman said. "It's the best economic value you will get in entertainment. I love the movies, not dissing the movies, I go to the movie theater. But, for what you will pay to go to the movies and buy a pop and stuff, you will see one thing: A movie. For that same amount of money, you will come out here and see literally thousands of things."

Neppel Days seeks local history buffs

Annual event a time to remember area's pioneers

By Matthew Weaver

Herald staff writer

MOSES LAKE — The Neppelians are not kids any more.

"It's getting hard to find somebody that can do it," said Harold Hochstatter, one of the coordinators of the Neppel Days, which will be taking place Wednesday at 1 p.m. in the Grange Hall on the Grant County Fairgrounds, part of the Grant County Fair.

The event is a time for the area's "old pioneers" to get together and reminisce.

"We're really needing to expand it to anybody that wants to come," Hochstatter said. "The changing of the name (from Neppel to Moses Lake) is one thing, but the other thing is that the town was really not much until about 1950, up until the water came."

Neppel was a small town platted around the body of water Moses Lake in about 1911, while Moses Lake was a small town up around what is presently Nelson Road, Hochstatter said.

"The lake was called Moses Lake, but there was no town here," he pointed out.

Hochstatter said the origin of the name Neppel is a mystery.

As Neppel grew and more people came to town, the town of Moses Lake, which was never platted, failed to develop and the federal government pulled out the small town's post office in 1934.

"When they lost the post office, they really lost their identity," Hochstatter said. "It's like when they used to consolidate schools. If you lost your school in these little towns, that was your whole identity. Everybody came to all the basketball games and everything, it was a community event. Once a school was gone, a town was gone."

Some towns had to grow, and some towns wouldn't. Those that grew had something to draw people, and around the lake, orchards were growing and made things look nicer, Hochstatter explained.

The town of Neppel voted to change its name to Moses Lake in 1938.

"People like to visit," Hochstatter said of the Neppel Days event, which has been taking place for decades. "They like to come there, they don't see these people, a lot of them have moved away. And it's kind of like a class reunion in a way."

Some people still living in the area don't attend, but Hochstatter and several people are trying to generate interest in the event.

"If you've got an interest in old history, come and see, and many of us bring pictures," he said. "I'll have a whole bunch of pictures, and we hope to have a copy machine out there."

A longtime pioneer, now deceased, who was born on the site of what is presently Moses Pointe, would often get frustrated because while her mind was sharp, her vision was gone, and so she could not tell who people were in photos that she probably would have known, Hochstatter said.

"She'd just get so frustrated because she probably knew them, but couldn't see them," he said. "It's an example of how history is lost. So we're hoping to get people there and say, 'Oh, that's old Uncle So-and-so.'"

Hochstatter was born and raised in the area. The Hochstatter side of his family homesteaded in Gloyd, about 12 miles up Stratford Road, while his mother's family homesteaded in Tokio.

"The town has got a progressive atmosphere about it," he said. "These people are rip-roaring folks. They come from someplace else, they're a 'give me a shot at it' kind of people, and I think it's the Old West all over again. I really like it. I think that viewpoint still persists. There's a can-do feeling about people who come from some place, and everybody here did, practically."

Hochstatter said he wants people to attend the event, get a feeling for the history of the town and talk to the people who were there.

"Come to the Neppel Days, meet some of these folks, swap some stories, look at some pictures and bring some," he said.

Anybody with questions may call Hochstatter at (509) 765-8164.