Sunday was the next to the last day of the next to the last fair in Lincoln, and big horses were also signed up for other crowd-pleasing attractions, including barrel racing, an obstacle course, and the grand finale show
ART HOVEY / Lincoln Journal Star | Posted: Sunday, August 31, 2008 7:00 pm
They’re the gentle giants of the equine world, and they took over the Coliseum at the Nebraska State Fair Sunday to strut their stuff.
Percherons, Clydesdales and Belgians, some weighing a ton or more, make up the big three of draft horses. Many come from impeccable blood lines, and all are bred for size and power, rather than speed.
The fancier and higher steppers owned by Bill and Judy Crouch of Casey, Ill., and Ken Pimentel of Delhi, Calif., were among the animals holding forth in the halter classes earlier in the day at State Fair Park.
Later on, farm teams from Goehner, Indianola, Red Cloud and Vernon Curtis’s Percheron-cross mules from Milford trotted into the ring to impress the judge with their ability to respond to shouts of “gee” (go left), “haw” (go right) and to maneuver wooden-wheeled grain wagons across a sandy surface.
Getting horses to back up in tandem and to move a wagon backwards is one of the trickier parts in competition.
Samantha Mousel, 18, of Red Cloud, said it was fun to show an audience what the Percheron pair of Maude and Molly could do, but it’s even more fun to hold the reins back home as they pull equipment from the horse-drawn era.
“I like to stick to plowing and all that,” Mousel said. “That’s more my style.”
Sunday was the next to the last day of the next to the last fair in Lincoln, and big horses were also signed up for other crowd-pleasing attractions, including barrel racing, an obstacle course, and the grand finale showcase event, in which six horses harnessed to the same hitch compete to see which team can move the most weight.
Bill and Judy Crouch came to Lincoln for the first time to cap 30 years of hitch and halter competition at state fairs and hundreds of shows across the Midwest and Canada.
Why quit now?
“Look us over,” said Bill Crouch. “It’s a lot of work and we’re old.”
What a state fair audience typically sees from the Crouches is carefully groomed mares assuming classic showmanship stances.
The training phase is not always as pretty.
“They look their best just before they get away,” Bill Crouch said.
Judy Crouch said she has some special memories that have nothing to do with owning the mare that once held the record for mothering the most All-American qualifiers or owning another Belgian that was the highest-selling mare at one point in the 1990s.
“They ran down the lane,” she said in recounting a runaway episode. “The cart turned upside down . . . I jumped off and slid across the ground on my belly.”
There’s nothing uncommon about those sorts of experiences. “If you haven’t had it happen, you’ve not driven very much.”
Ken Pimentel and draft horse partners Steve and Kathy Ferrasci of Clovis, Calif., were completing a state fair circuit that also included stops in Missouri and Iowa.
“There are only a few shows left in California,” Pimentel said. “Most fairs are doing away with the agricultural part and going mostly with monster trucks and things that they can charge money for.”
That apparent trend is also marked by big gaps in knowledge among fair goers about the animals that did the field work before the tractors came along.
“People try to feed them cotton candy and things like that,” he said.
Elsewhere on the fairgrounds Sunday, Mallory Murdoch of Orleans showed the winning entry in the 4-H market lamb show.
Patricia Bohaty of Blair showed the top gilt (female) in the FFA Swine Show and Garrett Pearson of the Oakland-Craig FFA chapter showed the top barrow (male).
Murdoch, 18 and a senior at Holdrege High School, came out on top in a field of almost 320 lambs. It was her third championship in the same event in four years.
Jessica Wallander, 16, of Bertrand showed the reserve champion lamb.
There were 326 entries in the FFA hog show. Kali Reinsch of Fillmore Central showed the reserve champion female and her brother, Derek, showed the reserve champion male.
Livestock competition will culminate today with the Parade of Champions and selection of the grand champion in the 4-H market beef show.
Final attendance figures for the fair are not expected to be available until Tuesday. Attendance through Friday was up 9 percent from last year.
Reach Art Hovey at 473-7223 or at ahovey@journalstar.com