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The fair’s all about watching creatures in its whirl

by Joe Tarr

When I get to the Tennessee Valley Fair, my first thought is “Where are the cows?” I don’t really know what it is, but there’s something about cows that really freaks me out. In a good way, I mean.

When I was a kid riding past pastures in the backseat of the car, I’d chirp out “MOO COW” every time I’d see one. Although they seem relatively stupid and cute, I later learned there was a sinister side of cows. Following my dad and brother through fields as we hunted for groundhogs, the cows would sometimes chase us. Dad would yell not to run, but it’s tough to stand your ground against a couple of 1,000-pound creatures when you’re 9.

So on a Sunday at the fair, the first attractions I’m eager to see are these exotic beasts up close. As I approach the show pavilion I see a long line of brown cows waiting to enter, their owners leading them along by harnesses. The cow heads moo, and some of them sporadically thrust away from their owners. I imagine a cow mutiny, the Holsteins and Jersey cows storming down the hill to the midway games and rides. Not that half the people here would be all that surprised if it happened.

The Fair is a place where we go to stare at things—creatures, people not like us. And we get stared back at in return. It may sound cruel, brash, but there’s a refreshing honesty in the spectacle. And this year, the fair doesn’t disappoint.

As I sidle down into one of the pavilion’s concrete seats, it’s not just the cows that fascinate, but also this whole small-town farm culture, which has become so alien to most of us. I wonder what the handlers think as they push and maneuver their cow to go where it often doesn’t care to. Are they embarrassed when the cow shits or pisses in front of the crowd? Do the people in the audience have a favorite? What is the judge looking for? Does any of this seem remotely unusual to the cows?

After it’s all over, I corner the lone judge, Terry Rawn. He works for Alta Genetics, a Wisconsin company that produces hormones and genetic material to raise cows that produce milk more efficiently.

“We have both worlds here, right on top of each other. It’s a pretty sharp contrast,” Rawn says, pointing down the hill where shrieks and shrills emanate from the carnival rides and games.

“We’re looking for quality and characteristics consistent with high milk production,” he says. “It’s hard to describe to someone who didn’t grow up around dairy cows.” But a lot of it is size, structure, and the condition of the udder.

Only three of the main cow breeds were represented at the fair, but Rawn says the quality is pretty good. “The top end of the class is extremely good. We’re definitely dealing with the upper 10 percent of the breed.”

The number of farmers showing at fairs around the country is declining, Rawn says, as more and more of the agriculture is taken over by large corporations. Large agri-business doesn’t bother with fairs, and I wonder what their cows would look like. There is perhaps an irony in that Rawn’s business—making cows more “efficient” through genetics—is actually leading to the decline in fair showing. Good or bad, that’s an argument for another day.

Up at the sheep and goat barn I expect to see a similar parade of animals. There are plenty of sheep—their cacophony of “baaaas” (with occasional hacking accompaniment) rises up through the rafters. But there are also a lot of little kids and teenagers looking like they just came from church or are about to go trick ‘r treating. It’s a 4-H contest known as “Wool and Woollies.” It’s mostly a fashion show of wool clothing, cute boys and girls, and an adorable, if sometimes disagreeable, ewe.

The kids lead their sheep around past the judges table, then let an attendant hold the animal while they strut across a small wooden catwalk, displaying their pleated wool skirts, pink sweaters, dress suits and sturdy outdoor clothing. One boy wears wool slacks, a red checkered hunting shirt, and suspenders and carries a wooden axe in his pants. An older kid is dressed in a sailor suit, and his animal has an identical sailor’s cap fastened to its horns.

I had come to the sheep and goat barn expected to see animals, not cute kids and fashionable teenagers. It’s partly adorable, partly disturbing. About halfway through I begin to feel like a pervert and flee.

The fair can be great fun when you’re with friends, romantic if you’re with a lover. But if you’re alone, it can lead to frightful bouts of existential angst, when all that is wrong with humanity smacks you in painful epiphanies. Adorable fluffy ducklings should not cause such distress. And, yet....

I walk through the petting zoo—always one of my favorites—and come to the popular baby duck slide. It’s a Sisyphean tale played out on a barnyard stage: the ducks climb little steps onto a small platform warmed by a heat lamp; if they lean toward a tray of food placed slightly out of reach, they are likely to topple down the slide into the water. It’s cute perhaps because it’s also sad. Tonight the ducks aren’t biting. They seem completely uninterested in food. Perhaps they’ve just been fed or are a little chilly and are more interested in staying warm under the heat light. But I fantasize they’ve finally figured out the joke is on them, and they’re not playing anymore; they’d rather starve. In the 15 minutes I watch, only three fall down the slide, and two of them because they were pushed by ducks jockeying for better position.

They do cluster close to the edge of the platform, however, and a fat kid impatiently waits. Every now and then he barks out a “Hey;” I think in hopes of startling a duckling over the edge.

The people are even more fun to gawk at than the animals. This is most apparent in the hypnotist’s tent. His name is Terry Stokes Jr., and he comes off as vaguely creepy, littering many of his jokes with double entendres. He’s the kind of guy you’d expect to see hanging out in a HoJo’s bar on the interstate of any American city, trying to seduce waitresses. But in a way he’s just playing up what a lot of us are thinking—fantasies of control tend to bring out baser instincts.

The hypnotism isn’t terribly elaborate, but the subjects certainly seem under his spell. Stokes moves around the stage, putting each subject to sleep, making a popping noise into the microphone each time, as though he were shooting them with a mind-control gun.

He makes one woman forget the number six and then count her fingers. She becomes alarmed that she might in fact have 11 fingers and repeats the process over and over, then on the guy sitting next to her. Stokes puts that guy to sleep and then suggests she take off his shoes and socks and count his toes. Eleven, once again. Later, he tells the guy he can’t get his socks back on no matter how hard he tries, then he tells him those socks are gloves—the guy puts them on his hands, satisfied.

One of Stokes’ big gags is to tell his subjects they’re in love with the hypnotist and will be in ecstasy if they dance with him, but show extreme jealously (nothing physical) if he’s dancing with someone else. Some subjects hold their arms out to Stokes, begging him to pick them. A woman squirms in her chair, folds her arms across her chest with indignation as Stokes keeps picking others. It all feels kind of degrading, but it’s also kind of funny.

Although you can gape uninhibited at the hypnotized, the best people-watching is down in the midway, where the carnival barkers apply various hard and soft sells to coax people to take a chance on a game. The games are easy, and just about everyone is a winner, they assure.

Most of the games I watched didn’t go so well. The basketball shoot seems especially hard. The ladder climb is deceptively hard. It’s a rope ladder that stretches out at about a 45-degree angle to a buzzer. It’s prone to flipping over and dumping the climber onto a large balloon mattress. Nobody can do it. One of the young women working the booth keeps shaming the guys who attempt it by quickly climbing the ladder to show them how it’s done.

The game workers might be the most interesting in the bunch. There are plenty of young people, both male and female, and a significant number of Latinos. But there are also a lot of lifers—older white guys, some of them haggard, most of them with smirks on their faces. Cigarettes dangle from their lips as they nonchalantly dare people to take a shot at darts or water games or a baseball toss.

“Watching’s for ladies,” one guy at the basketball shoot tells me. His name is Edward Van Dusen; he says he’s been working the fair circuit since he was 10, when he spent summers blowing up balloons, while his uncle worked one of the rides. He’s 30 now. He’s worked all the games but likes the basketball shoot best because there’s good money to be made, and the rules are simple: $2 for one shot, $5 for three; a basket wins a big stuffed animal. They work on commission and are on the road from February to November.

Chilhowee Park is the biggest fairground he’s ever been on. He’s happy with the crowd. It doesn’t feel like he’s in the South—he might as well be in his hometown, Detroit. After 20 years, he still loves the work.

“I’ll be doing this until I’m dead,” he says.

I’m sure I’ll be back every year to look around.

September 16, 2004 • Vol. 14, No. 38 © 2004 Metro Pulse