🎡 Barron County Fair | July 16–20, 2025
Summer Days, Country Ways 🌾✨
Join us for family fun, thrilling rides, delicious fair food, live entertainment, animal shows & good old-fashioned memories.
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đź“ŤRice Lake The first fair was held September 25 and 26, 1877 at Barron. The total receipts of the fair were $103.75 and the disbursements were $49.45. Of this
amount $23 was paid as premiums for a total of thirteen entries, which included one stallion, one draft horse, a team of oxen, several hogs and some fruits and vegetables. In 1879 the fair purchased a small tract of land for the fair grounds at Barron, but in 1887 sold it for $110. The fair was held in Barron in 1877, 1879, and 1880. In 1878 it was held at Sumner. For eighteen years, 1881 to 1898 it was held at Chetek. The Chetek years were when horse racing started as there was state funds for pursues at that time. One of the fastest horses in the area ran away with the driver and he was killed between Cumberland and Barron. In those days men and women’s bicycling was very popular plus oxen pulling. The Chetek city band usually finished the music on the final day of the event. In 1899 the fair moved to its present location in the City of Rice Lake on land leased from W. Burrows from Madison. They purchased the property in 1911. The advantages were that it had electric lights, water, and sewer connections. 1913 saw the county appropriate $2,000 for an agricultural building, and in 1916 $1,000 for a cattle barn. On the first board of directors was W. Grover a Dallas township pioneer and the county’s second county clerk. He is famous for hiding the county record in a hollow out wooden chair and caring from Rice Lake to Barron on a cold wintery night and the county records have been kept in Barron ever since. In 1939 a Dr. O. Sattre took a judgment of foreclosure against the fair for a mortgage of $7,500 and with the interest and cost the figure was nearly $9,000. No action was taken as the interest was paid and the fair had one year to reclaim the property which they did in time for the 1940 fair. It was at this time, shares of stock were sold for $10 each with a total of 500 to help pay off the debt. Stock is still traded today for the $10 and if you have share it is still worth $10. Many people holding the old stock are holding it hoping it will be valuable if the grounds are sold. There is a clause in the old agreement that if the fair goes out of business the stock holders will all get the $10 investment back and the rest of the money goes to Barron County. The fair moved into the modern era quite quickly in 1977 when it celebrated its 100 birthday. In that year, long time manager Adolph Buergi resigned and he was replaced by present manager Tim Heffernan. In 1965 the livestock sale was started to teach meat animal production to the youth of Barron County. Don Triebensee, an Agriculture teacher at Rice Lake started this project. The year prior to its start there were three hogs displayed. This was the start of a great scholarship program as youth use the profits from the sale to finance education, and for herd improvement for their project. The first year of the program it took in $2,486.88 and in 2008 the total was $123,084.00. The grand total to this point is $2,387,483.75. Another scholarship program was started in 1967. That was the “Fairest of the Fair Contest.” The top three each year receive college scholarship money. The Barron County Fair’s entry then competes at the state level to be co host of the Wisconsin State Fair along with Alice in Dairyland. The state “Fairest” is a summer employee of the state fair and promotes fairs throughout the state. The “State Fairest” in the State contest winners from Barron County were Kay Matthys in 1982, Katie Olson in 1994, Julia Ellefson in 1998, and Allison Gonske 2001. In 1988 the need to build newer barn system for the cattle, with support of many people the two cattle barns along hwy 48 where built that. Also in aug the fair had a manger fire that ruined curling club building, this building was aslo used to house projects during the fair, and 4h horse barn. damage est was over $300,000 in buildings and curling equipment. The fair rebuilt a new horse barn on that site that houses 100 horse for fair. In 1994 the fair built a larger young expo building and took down two older barns. This is after 5 years of looking into the cost of making the fair more modern which incudle looking into moving to a site just north of Barron this neve happen do to support from the locals for the fair to stay at the current site. In 2009 the fair borrow $200,000 in a form of a loan form the county to build a new pig/sheep barn, show arena, and an open barn for over flow. An Don Triebensee fund was started to help fund more capital to help with steel stalls and onsite scale and head gate. Barron County was one of the first smaller fairs in the state to put in a scale system of this type. In 2012 after long time fair board member and 4-her Bob kolzow death. The Bob Kolzow fund was started this was to help update the camping area with more power for the bigger campers. This raise over $3,000 to help cover part of the update cost.
