Sunday, September 12, 2010

Kansas State Fair 2010


12-Pounder Mountain Howitzer


Our State Fair opened Friday the 10th and ends a week from today, on the 19th. Did I get the attention of my military friends with the artillery piece above? There are a couple more pictures of this and more from my day at the fair Saturday. I'll add more at this link during the week.

State Senator Tom Holland and US Senator Sam Brownback are competing to be the next governor of Kansas, and they showed up to debate each other at the fair. The crowd was small, maybe a couple hundred and good-natured for the most part, we Kansans generally being hospitable to each other. Here's our local paper's story with more pictures and comments and the KC Star, with an important interview at the bottom of the column.

Not all my time was political. Farm implements and Green Machines, fair food ( I always head for Connie's Funnel Cakes with Strawberry and Cherry toppings! ), the Midway where I dropped a fin to prove to the passing crowd I can't drop an oddly weighted basketball through the net, and just people walking and talking and having fun for the most part. And the animals! I'll have some pix of those. I've not seen this year's Butter Sculpture yet, but be assurred, I'll post it.

After the debate, I hooked up with my buddies at the Democratic Party booth. Ours looks better than the Republicans', but you'll be able to judge for yourselves in a few days. At least we look better. ;)

Any other State Fair attendees out there?

4 comments:

  1. basil-

    Was the weapons display one belonging to the Kansas National Guard? Why would they have needed a 12p mountain howitzer?

    Kinda looks like what Major Dundee took with him on his campaign into Mexico to capture or destroy the Apache Warchief Sierra Carriba . . .

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  2. The piece belongs to the park service. I'm off to the fair again in a bit to man our booth, so I'll do a bit more research on the piece. The howitzer apparently is pictured on this Ft. Larned website.

    http://www.nps.gov/fols/index.htm

    I'll have more pictures on flikr later today. And talking of pieces, yours ( which I assume is much lighter than 12 pounds :) ) is on my to-do list.

    bb

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  3. Update

    The howitzer belongs to Fr.Larned Kansas National Park. It is still fired occasionally with powder and wadding, no shot.

    More pix

    http://tinyurl.com/3x8vodv

    Had an interesting time manning the Democratic Party booth today.

    bb

    ReplyDelete
  4. Update includes KNG equipment and most important, butter sculpture.

    http://tinyurl.com/2wucu9b

    bb

    ReplyDelete