Ventura County Fair Ends With Shucks and Shouts

Ambling among the crowds along Ventura County Fair’s main drag Sunday afternoon, there was little indication that it would all come to an end after the evening’s fireworks show.

After the last rocket’s ember had faded into the summer evening sky, the carnival workers would begin folding up their stalls and loading their rides onto awaiting trucks. The souvenir and food vendors would pack up for the journey home, leaving the fairgrounds a windblown ghost town.

Home for Barry Wittenberg, proprietor of Corn Roasters West, is the Sonoma County town of Forestville. Although the task of putting away equipment and making sure nothing is left behind promises to be tiresome, Wittenberg will be smiling all the way home on the long drive back to California’s wine country.

“This is going to be my best year,” said Wittenberg, his sunglasses perched below a large yellow ear of corn painted in the middle of his forehead. “It’s because I got great corn.”

Fair organizers also were pleased about this year’s crowds, which, as of Sunday, appeared to be up slightly from last year.

Fair spokeswoman Teri Raley said an estimated 230,000 people had attended the fair by Saturday. With above-average attendance expected on closing day, fair organizers should have no trouble meeting their target of a quarter-million visitors.

“The grandstand attendance has been consistently high,” Raley said.

Three grandstand shows brought in 9,000 or more people: Willie Nelson with around 9,500, Gallagher with 9,000 and Patty Loveless with more than 10,000.

Raley said the rodeo events this year have also been full, and the stock car races and other motor sports were sold out both nights.

“The second night we had to turn people away,” Raley said.

Back on the midway, Wittenberg, clad in one of a dozen shirts he owns printed with ears of corn, wasn’t turning anyone away. He and his crew prepared and sold their hot buttered snack from a green and yellow tent, which stood out from the rows of white trailers selling imported beer, Polish sausage and cowboy hats.

Occasionally, Wittenberg’s workers barked out: “Have an ear with your beer” or “Come and nibble on our ears.” The crowd obliged, lining up for a sweet taste of Ventura County.

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For this year’s fair, Wittenberg bought his supply of corn from Underwood Ranch in Somis.

“We do this to bring out the fair’s corny atmosphere,” Wittenberg said with a straight face. “It’s just to get people to smile. That’s what we’re here for.”

Wittenberg, who was working his fifth year at the fair, said he noticed more people smiling this year.

“It’s been a good crowd, a mellow crowd,” he said.

A sizable group gathered Sunday morning in front of the Pepsi Seabreeze Community Stage to watch an hourlong cheerleading event that pitted high school teens in a competition to yell louder, dance better and do the most difficult tricks.

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“It’s, like, cleaner than all the [earlier fairs.] I know I feel safer here than I probably would anywhere else,” said 16-year-old Katie Pede, a junior at Newbury Park High School who competed in the event.

First place in the competition was won by Carpinteria High School. Hueneme High School placed second, and Oxnard’s Yellowjackets came in third.

“There’s a lot of rivalry,” said Carissa Tarazon, a 16-year-old senior at Oxnard High.

Across the fairgrounds at the animal pens, Brian Moore had some free time to see almost everything at the fair. The 15-year-old sophomore from Thousand Oaks had spent nearly two weeks in a dusty pen taking care of a pig he had raised through his local 4-H Club.

Brian had only one suggestion for improving the fair next year.

“Next year, they’ve got to get a rock band,” he said. “That’s all I’ve got to say.”