Russell Co. Free Fair - Russell, KS

This post is all about my visit to the Russell County Free Fair in Russell, KS.  It was way back on July 25th.  It was hot, dang hot when I rolled into town that day.  There wasn't much going on when I got to the fairgrounds.  It was a little early, but there WAS a guy carving a giant eagle out of a log, with a chainsaw.  He was wearing music earphones under his big, orange ear protectors and was dancing a storm, while doing his carving.  I liked it.

I did my usual roaming around looking for interesting people to talk to and to hopefully get an image or two of.  I met a few of the carnival workers.  They were super friendly and let me take some photos.  Saw a guy working on a ride(Octopus).  I asked him if he'd mind me taking some shots of him while he was doing his thing and he replied, "nope, but it's usually the 14 and 15 year olds in line that have the crushes on me".  A simple yes or no would've done, buddy!  I took his photo anyway. 

Eventually, I made my way over to the arena to watch some Mutton' Bustin'(kids riding sheep).  I got to see a few kids get tossed in the dirt.  That's always a fun time.  Then I noticed that the sky had gotten really dark and there was a pretty weird quality to the light.   A really big wind blew through the fair and that sent all of the carnies running to baton down all of the rides.  I got some shots of what I'm pretty sure was a funnel cloud taking shape, over the arena.  It was pretty ominous.  I ran around shooting fast and made it back to my car just before the downpour came.  It rained hard for several hours and the carnival was called off due to the lightning and tornado warnings. 

I'm pretty pleased with a few of the images I captured at this fair.  The storm put an end to my shooting, but it really helped to make my images more dynamic.  Anyway, enough rambling.  Here are some images.  Quite a few this time.

p.s.  Prints of these images, along with all of the images in my previous posts on this blog, can now be purchased at this link.  The prints are made by me, in my studio, on 100% cotton fiber archival paper and can even be matted and delivered to you, ready to be framed.  If you have any questions, here's my email.  I check it.

   

Franklin County Fair - Ottawa, KS

The next installment of my Fair Affair Blog is the Franklin Co. fair which takes place in Ottawa, KS, just a short drive from where I live in Lawrence, KS.

Truth be told, I almost didn't make it to this fair.  I almost skipped it.  I had been on the road for 4 days, shooting fairs, in 100+ temperatures and this was my last scheduled fair to shoot on this trip.  As I was driving back from Columbus, KS, all I could think about was getting home to my cool air conditioned studio.  I passed through Ottowa, was within 15 miles of home, when my guilt got the best of me, and I turned around and headed back to the fair.  I was pretty grumpy about it...

The Franklin Co. fair is a pretty large fair compared to most that I visited.  There was a rodeo, 4H competitions, rides, music, and tons of food.  Oh and did I mention that it was hot?  It was ungodly hot.  I think my cameras were sweating.  At any rate, I decided to focus more on people portraits at this fair.  It's easy for me to shoot candids of people from afar, but I'm much more intimidated to approach strangers, asking if I can take their portrait.  It's something that I got much better at as my fair journey progressed.

Anyway, I think I got some nice images from this fair, despite the heat!  Take a look...

Cherokee County Fair - Columbus, KS

Hello blogworld.  Sorry for the long delay in posting.  I wanted to keep these posts going in a timely fashion, but I've been too busy working on the photographic endeavors that pay my bills.  Hopefully I can crank these out a little faster over the next few months.

So let's get to it!   This post is about my journey to the Cherokee Co. Fair, way down in Columbus, KS.  I had never been to the far reaches of Southeast Kansas before, so every part of this trip was fresh and new for me.  Columbus is a sleepy little Kansas town.  The tallest structures were the grain silos.  It was a scorching 105 degrees when I got to the fairgrounds(it was over 100 at every fair I attended on this leg of my trip).  Because of the heat, not much was happening when I got there.  The 4-H kids were trying to keep their animals cool and most of the carnival workers were nowhere to be found.  As I was wandering around the carnival rides, a large man, smoking a cigar, in a golf cart rolled up next to me.  Turns out he was the owner of the carnival company and offered to give me a golf cart tour of the fairgrounds.  I turned down his offer, mostly because he was so big that there was hardly enough room for me in that cart.  Not to mention that he was very much a stranger to showers.  At any rate, we chatted for a bit, he was super nice.  I found out that he and his company were out of Lyford, TX and they do over 45 carnivals per year.  He told me I had the run of the place and to photograph what I wanted.

I decided to escape the heat, so I returned to my hotel room($35 a night and a total dive!  I loved it, my wife would not have).  Anyways, I got back to the fair as the sun was setting and it was already packed.  Squealing kids everywhere.  I photographed almost until the carnival shutdown for the night, stopping to have a few beers at the beer garden with the locals(one of my favorite parts about these fairs).  I had a woman ask me where she knew me from.  I told her I had never been to Columbus, KS before, to which she replied, "no, I've seen ya on t.v. or somethin".  I think the heat and or beer had her confused.

So, here are some of my images from the Cherokee Co. Fair.  I do my own printing from my studio, so if you'd like to purchase a print, feel free to email me or you can go to my Kansas Fair Affair Prints Gallery.

Thanks for looking!

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