The Creelman Ag Society is preserving a piece of our Western heritage with their amazing annual Fair that has all sorts of old-fashioned family-style entertainment that you won’t find in many places anymore.
As one wandered around on the fair grounds at Creelman, there were hundreds of people there all milling around and taking in the sights and events.
The events ranged from a horse show, agricultural exhibits, and displays in the pens of alpacas and donkey, live chickens (which were judged) along with cattle in the barns, a dog show, food booths, bingo, and a demo of an eight-horse hitch with a team of Clydesdale draught horses.
The Clydes weren’t able to come last year, so it was really good to see the team in action this year. I have to confess to an embarrassing moment, as I photographed the team at the ball diamond.
The driver drove the team over and at the last moment made a tight turn right in front of the spectators. I was watching this through the lens of my camera, so I didn’t have an accurate view of where the horses were, and I kind of got really startled and backed away because I thought I would be run over.
The driver, of course, had perfect and total control of his horses, and no such danger existed, so he was probably laughing at the “city boy” who was over-reacting to how close the horses got to me.
Anyway, the skydiving demo also went off, which also couldn’t happen last year due to windy conditions, and that was cool.
The pig scramble is probably one of the most unique events that you won’t find at fairs any more, but is extremely popular for the visitors to the Creelman Fair.
I fear that this event might eventually run into the problem where city people will start claiming there’s animal abuse going on, as squealing little piglets are caught by children in the race.
There is no animal abuse going on, and there are many responsible adults around who are watching and would make sure this doesn’t happen — but the problem is, animal activists aren’t always very reasonable and cry “abuse” over any slight action that might be deemed to be a problem.
As a case in point, note the outcry that’s been ongoing over the horses involved in the chuckwagon races at the Calgary Stampede. Yes, it’s a tragedy that some horses were killed, but people don’t understand that the owners love and care for these animals the best they can, and do not want them to be hurt, ever.
Accidents happen, however, like they do in most any sphere of life or activity. Life goes on, as it should, and perhaps good sense will rule.
