By Jon Chown
The Santa Cruz County Fairgrounds was a beehive of activity Saturday, Sept. 12, as employees, volunteers and members of the public prepared for the Santa Cruz County Fair, which started Sept. 16 and runs through Sept. 20.
Vendors were setting up, workers were cleaning up, and a host of volunteers were busy taking entries, judging them, displaying them and making sure everything was just perfect for opening day.
Over at the Agricultural History Project, Nic Keiderling, Kevin Erbe and Bob Erbe were repairing a wooden water wheel outside the Codiga Center and Museum.
“It’s all good wood. It gets wet, and then it dries out, cracks and starts to self-destruct,” Bob Erbe said. “So we’re going to try something different.”
The men were placing plastic inside the wheel’s small buckets and sealing gaps to help them hold more water.
Bob and Kevin Erbe
Keiderling estimated that the wheel underwent a major rebuilding 12 to 15 years ago. Since then, maintaining it has become an annual part of the group’s fair preparations.
Elsewhere on the grounds, exhibitors carried baked goods, quilts, crafts and other creations into the Home Arts building, where volunteers checked in entries and prepared them for judging.
The assortment of baked goods included cakes, cheesecakes, cookies, candies, cupcakes and breads. Volunteers expected the tables, still partly empty early in the day, to be filled by the 5 p.m. entry deadline.
The entries were scheduled to be judged the following day while they were still fresh.
One of those bringing in baked goods was Santa Cruz resident Julian Dahan, a first-time fair exhibitor. His entries included sourdough bread, brown-butter macadamia nut blondies, milk bread rolls and honey-vanilla French sea salt caramels.
Dahan described baking as a “very big, encompassing hobby.”
“I’ve been baking and cooking my whole life,” he said. “My grandmother is a baker and a chef, and I grew up in the kitchen. It’s not what I do for work, but it’s what I do for fun.”
Dahan said he won an award for his sourdough at another event the previous week, so he decided to enter the county fair for the first time.
Home Arts volunteers were also arranging quilts and other handmade entries throughout the building. Lisa Dahlgren of Corralitos said volunteers are essential to making the fair possible.
“You’ve got to love the volunteers,” she said. “Otherwise, it doesn’t work. It just wouldn’t happen.”
The quilt display featured a wide variety of work, including a piece called “Puppy Play” and several quilts depicting animals.
Home Arts Department Head Nancy Chames said preparations had gone well because volunteers were willing to take responsibility for different parts of the exhibit.
“I have a great group that works with me, so I do less and less, which is fine,” Chames said. “Everybody just pitches in and is good at certain things, and they just take it over.”
Chames said she has served as the department head for nearly seven years. Volunteers specializing in quilts, baking, jams and decorating helped organize and color-coordinate the displays.
Judging was also underway for entries submitted by children and teenagers. Judges Emily Casterson of Watsonville and Marjorie Turnquist of Aptos tasted the baked goods and prepared comments while caring for their own young children.
Casterson said she and Turnquist began judging in other departments before being asked to evaluate baked goods.
“We started in different areas doing different judging, and then other judges were needed because some retired or left,” Casterson said. “We got pulled into this judging particularly.”
Turnquist said they had judged other types of fair entries during the week.
“We were doing crafts yesterday,” Turnquist said. “I think I started in preserves because I did a lot of canning.”
The women said they to consider the age and expected skill level when judging youth entries.
“You get to see the ages. Like, this kid’s 14,” Turnquist said. “Some of the kids are 7, so you’ve got to kind of think, ‘Are these cookies good for a 7-year-old?’ Versus if you see the kid’s 16 and it looks like they just threw something together. You have to account for their age and what their skill set would be around that age.”
Casterson said judges also consider whether parents might have assisted younger children and whether that help was reasonable for safety reasons.
“If they’re younger and it’s looking really well put together, what’s the possibility that parents helped?” Casterson said. “Is it reasonable that a parent would help for safety purposes?”
The judges said their comments are intended to encourage young exhibitors and help them develop their skills.
“You’re going to give a lot more feedback, trying to do improvement and encouragement,” Casterson said. “What should they look for and do while they’re baking to help improve, so that next year when they enter, they’ve got a better product?”
“It’s more of a teaching thing, I think, with the kids,” Turnquist said. “You want them to know what to improve on next year.”
Among the young exhibitors was 14-year-old Raylin Moules, who entered a loaf of sourdough bread.
“I do it occasionally,” Moules said of baking bread. “My mom does it a lot. She helped me a little bit.”