MOUNT VERNON — It’s that time of year again: time for the Knox County Fair.
The 176th fair is set to take place from July 19 to 26. The 21 board members and roughly 100 volunteers are almost ready to welcome visitors and debut the fair’s latest attractions and logistical updates.
Ticket booth updates
Two ticket booths, located at Gates 4 and 6, will accept credit cards. Gate 4 is located near the horse arenas. Gate 6 is commonly referred to as the walk-in gate.
“This year, we put a lot more emphasis on making sure that [credit card ticket booths] happen,” Senior Fair Board President Jim Ruhl said. “It’s more of a convenience, but also easier for us to keep track of head count and stuff at the fair.”
The fair board strategically placed the gates that accept credit cards to allow shuttles to transport people to the main area. Gates 4 and 6 will have two ticket lines, which allows for a more efficient flow of traffic.
Eventually, the fair board plans to have every ticket booth equipped with credit card readers. However, the fair is not quite ready for that this year.
“If we put it at every gate, those poor people [ticket takers] would be overwhelmed,” Senior Fair Board Treasurer Cora Lyon-Eberhardt said. “We’d be asking a lot.”
Junior Fair livestock sale
In Ruhl’s opinion, the biggest change to the 2025 fair is moving the Junior Fair livestock sale from Thursday to Friday.
“We moved it to Friday just to keep animals on the grounds a little bit longer,” Ruhl said. “A lot of people come into the fair for events, dinner down in front of the grandstand, and they walk through the barns. When our sale was on Thursday, there were no animals.”
The date change frees up a day of the fair, allowing for less overlap of events and animal showcases. It also gives friends and family a better opportunity to see youths show multiple animals.
Construction and grounds work
Construction of a new hog barn began in early spring and is nearly ready for its first visitors.
“The barn has brand new pens, a brand new building, and brand new bleachers. Its process took forever, but we’re getting there,” Ruhl said.
Fair board members moved concrete barriers to widen the pulling track. That took up two weekends’ worth of work, according to Ruhl.
For safety reasons, workers also cleaned up the fairgrounds a bit and removed some trees.
“We have a lot of trees on this ground, and some of them were starting to get hollow or rotten,” Ruhl said. “So, we had a tree company come in and pick and choose just for the safety aspect.”
Attractions and events
According to Ruhl, Rough Truck & Side by Side Racing night is always the busiest night of the fair. The event is scheduled for Wednesday at 7 p.m.
Ruhl shared a humorous memory about rough truck night at the fair:
“We had an individual come down from Marion County, and they were kind of the first fair to ever do this rough truck competition. He comes down, he’s kind of puffing his chest, saying, ‘You know, we’ve done this, but I heard yours is pretty nice.’ And I said, ‘Yeah, we’re pretty proud of it.’ He said, ‘What’s so special about it?’ I said, ‘Well, you can go ask any of the drivers out there, they come here and this is their Super Bowl of rough truck for the state of Ohio.’
“He started to chuckle. He went over to watch the show and came back to where I was standing and he’s like, ‘I fully understand this is freaking unreal.’”
For the first time in three years, Monster Truck Night returns to the fair on Friday. Start time is 7 p.m.
The Senior and Junior Fair boards have worked hard to put together a strong lineup of events for fair week.
All visitors are welcome at 601 Fairgrounds Road, Mount Vernon, for a fun fair experience.
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