By Sentinel-Tribune Staff
TONTOGANY — In his many Otsego High School agricultural teaching days and his 60 years of involvement with the Wood County Fair, dating back to August 1962, Bernie Scott has seen many changes in both the fair and the fairgrounds.
His first Wood County Fair experience was helping to set up the junior fair produce display.
“I think I showed up too early on set-up day helping arrange the displays,” Scott said. “I was alone for about an hour. That building is now a maintenance shed.”
Bernie Scott and his wife Jean.
supplied photo
Scott, who is now 85, was the vocational agriculture teacher at Otsego for 38 years.
Scott said there weren’t too many buildings on the fairgrounds when he first became involved.
“There were lots and lots of tents. Even the livestock show arena was in a tent.”
The fair then underwent a period of construction of buildings to replace some of the tents.
“In 1969, (fair officials) started talking about putting up those buildings. In 1970, they began building them,” Scott said.
At that same time, there were many fire codes fair officials had to deal with, Scott said.
“They had to put up concrete block firewalls between the standing two swine barns and two beef barns. Parts of the new show arena building’s wood tresses had to be treated with fire retardant chemicals, and those chemicals started to ‘dissolve’ the steel roofs within a couple of years.”
A promotional booth for the Wood County Fair from the 1980s.
The present junior fair building was built in the early 1970s, and maybe even started in 1969.
“Where the 4-H clubs had their exhibits, that’s now a maintenance and storage facility. In 1963, my first FFA educational booth was under the grandstand. Then it moved for a couple years into what is now the FOP building. Then, at least for one year, 4-H moved into what was a former dairy cattle barn, now it’s the Fine Arts display.
“One year we displayed our booths in the closed and empty former Jackson Sheet Metal Building adjacent to the fairgrounds, which eventually turned into a present-day shopping and office complex. The fair simply opened up a section of the chain link fence for easy access.”
In late 1969 and early 1970s, the fair board began talks with a company from Bryan, Ohio, to erect a pre-engineered steel building just north of an open ditch, which is the start of the Toussaint River, and was later enclosed underground with huge concrete piping. It was to become the new Junior Fair Building.
“That basic building cost about $93,000 to construct, which was a lot of money back then. I recollect the fair board spent $150,000 to start upgrading the fair buildings.”
Most of the expansion of the fairgrounds has been on the north end of the fairgrounds, Scott noted.
“You couldn’t expand to the south, which is a parking lot, and you couldn’t build anything to the east or west. The only direction they could go was to the north. (Fair officials) have purchased land to the north as it became available,” Scott said.
When the junior fair building was built, it was just an open, clear span building to house exhibits.
“They had heat, but they didn’t have air conditioning,” Scott recalled.
Another thing that has changed over the years, Scott said, is the quality of the 4-H and FFA junior fair education booths at the fair. The Junior Fair Building houses what Scott says is the biggest and best display of junior fair youth exhibits in the state.
“They now have better themes and photos in those booths.”
One of most important junior fair changes over the years, especially in the 1960s, has been the expanded inclusion of girls in FFA chapters. That started in 1969 when girls were officially permitted to be FFA members and participate in fair events, Scott said. Bowling Green FFA Chapter’s adviser, Paul Hartsook, read the future of FFA’s inclusion of females and led Ohio well before the 1969 action.
“I think this was one of the smartest moves the National FFA Organization made that expanded junior fair activities,” Scott said.
Even the terminology has changed over the years.
“It used to be called Vocational Agriculture and Future Farmers of America, but now it’s referred to as Agri-Science Education and the FFA.”
The junior fair and fair board officials replaced two former beef barns, two swine barns and the show arena over five years ago into the present day $2.2 million Pratt Pavilion Show Arena.
The means of traversing the fairgrounds during the fair has even changed over the years.
“At one time, the Otsego FFA used trolleys that were pulled by tractors to get people around the grounds and through the midway, all day and into the evenings,” Scott said. “We had several tractor dealers in the area that would donate the use of the tractors, which were driven by very capable FFA students. Now the sheriff’s office uses golf carts driven by deputies.”
Scott said fairgoers who used the trolleys paid 10 cents or 25 cents for the service. The sheriff’s office provides the golf cart transportation for free.
In more recent years, the Wood County Fair has provided more big-name entertainers.
In 1987, Scott and the Otsego FFA built a portable folding stage that was used by the entertainers.
“One of the first (acts) that used that portable stage was Miami Sound Machine (featuring Gloria Estefan). I was so busy with other things and traveling, I didn’t get to see them.”
That traveling included nearly two weeks attending the Ohio State Fair where his daughter, Joyce, was serving as Ohio State Fair queen.
Now that everyone has a cellphone, even communications at the fairgrounds has changed.
The Otsego FFA made about two dozen field phones mounted on pole for emergency phone boxes. They were connected by wire and were placed in different areas of the fairgrounds. They were managed by then Civil Defense staff members, which was common in the 1960s, Scott said. These phones were in addition to phone booths that were removed.
Junior Fair members have also changed over the years.
“Young people are more sophisticated and smarter now, especially with computers and smart phones,” Scott said.
150th Wood County Fair Celebration
A reception will be held Sunday from 4-6 p.m. at the Pratt Pavilion large conference room.
