Combine derby vital to Lind

Town of 500 floods with more than 5,000 spectators at annual event

Thousands of frenzied spectators will soon fill Lind's old rodeo arena to experience the annual Combine Demolition Derby which thrusts behemoth farm machinery into motorized combat. Announcer Bill Wills has worked 18 previous derbies and knows the excitement of the event well.

But it's more than a demolition derby, Wills said. The town needs the event to remain vital.

No more than 800 people have ever lived in Lind. Motorists traveling to places like Spokane, the Tri-Cities and Seattle speed by on Interstate 90 and Highway 395 several miles from this lonesome two-tavern farm town.

Lind has dwindled down to about 500 people. There's little reason to stop here.

Last year the town canceled its annual rodeo after 62 consecutive years, because the event was drawing smaller crowds every year and cost thousands of dollars to host.

Wills is a member of the Lind Lions Club, a group of volunteers whose sheer economic opportunism has generated the money Lind needs for youth sports, a Junior Miss competition, parades and other important local functions.

The combine derby has been the driving force behind the club's contributions.

"Without (the Lind Lions Club) I don't see much of a town being here," said Dale Stevenson, last year's club president and owner of Jim's Market.

The club sponsors nearly everything happening in town, Stevenson said, donating about $18,000 to local groups and events in 2005. The club is on pace to donate more this year.

Bill Loomis is a club member and the combine derby's founding father. He heard of a similar event and decided it was exactly what the town needed. In the combine derby's first year, 1988, there were nine teams competing. Loomis sold some of his old combines that year to get the competition started.

"Thank goodness Bill Loomis had the foresight to come up with (the combine derby)," Stevenson said. "That just kind of bailed our Lions Club out and gave us a new lease on life."

Loomis has a hook for a right arm, the result of a hunting accident, and he was known as Captain Hook when he competed in the event. He's won the event, placed second and taken third.

Current-club president Joe Holland said both Loomis and Wills donate a lot of their time and services to the town and the combine derby.

"They have both contributed a lot to the club," Holland said.

Fortunately, the show has become bigger every year. About 5,000 people attended last year, dwarfing the resident population.

People from as far away as South America and the Middle East have come to watch the annual event. A variety of national and international media have also covered the derby, attesting to its popularity and intrigue.

"The combine derby put Lind on the map," Wills said, his thick Kentucky accent as uncommon in this area as the derby itself. "Because this is where we raise hell with the combines."

Every year, the 73-year-old former Adams County Commissioner and current town council member's voice blares through the speakers of the town's rodeo grounds, as clouds of diesel fuel and dust hang in the air.

"It ain't like announcing a basketball game or a football game or something like that," Wills said. "You just get out there, you know the people, you know the rigs, and you know what's coming up next."

The combine derby rules are simple: Get a combine at least 25 years old and useless for future work in the field. Glass and overly-dangerous parts are removed. Finally, the last combine maneuvering in the arena wins.

Each team paints their combine according to a specific theme and chooses a name like "Grim Reaper," "Moondoggie Madness" or "Mean Gang Green."

Sixteen different towns from eastern Washington had teams competing in 2005.

The typical strategy for drivers is to attack the rear axles of their competitors. Pit-crew members demonstrate their ingenuity and help their drivers win by repairing the destruction suffered in the initial 15-minute heats in preparation for final heats.

It is a dangerous event, Wills said, and he's seen some near disasters.

If asked, he'll tell the story about a son who drove over his father with a combine as the machines paraded into the arena to begin one derby. The father, he said, suffered a broken leg.

He might also tell the story about a guy from Kennewick who entered the competition at the last minute with a smaller combine, only to be quickly toppled in battle.

"We let him in, he wasn't in there long and one of those big combines come up and hit him, just turned him over," Wills said. "Nobody got hurt, thank goodness."

The judges knew the smaller combine would not win, he said, they just wanted to give the crowd a good show. "It was like a tank against a wheelbarrow," he said.

Organizers have added another 1,000 seats to the arena this year and moved the combine derby from its usual Friday night position, to 3 p.m. on Saturday, June 10, hoping the change will attract a larger crowd.

"It makes me feel good that a little town like this puts something together, making it work and making some money for the community." said Loomis, who also owns Loomis Truck and Tractor in Lind.

"That's what holds the community together as far as finances are concerned," Loomis said. "It keeps all the programs going that need to be going that make the town work."