State Fair opens, organizers predict attendance will surpass 1 million

The State Fairgrounds were anything but quiet Thursday night. Vendors shouted from their booths, cajoling passers-by to play games, board rides or take a look at a woman who, as a sign outside the booth says, is half woman and half snake.

Wolf howls from Thursday night’s game against Florida State University echo from the Carter-Finley Stadium.

Inside, on the second floor of the Gov. Kerr Scott Building, Commissioner of Agriculture Steve Troxler sat at his desk, his window overlooking the lights outside.

And downstairs, amid the white and chocolate milk that members of the the Agriculture Institute Club are selling, the student art and the vendor booths selling household items like mops and dish towels, the upcoming election is almost palpable.

Troxler, who manages the N.C. State Fair and is running for his second term as Commissioner of Agriculture, will work from this desk for the next 10 days. He’s relocated his office — and staff — from their office downtown across from the Capitol Building.

“This is one of the beauties of Commissioner of Agriculture,” Troxler said. “This is a big part of my responsibility,” he said, motioning toward the fair behind him.

And he expects this year’s turnout will top last year’s 859,000 visitors — despite the economic downturn that’s causing many North Carolinians to cut excess spending where they can.

Troxler said his goal for this fair is to have 1 million people pass through the fair’s gates.

“This is the first year that we’ve opened the State Fair on a Thursday,” Troxler said. “The State Fair is weather dependent — it’s hard to predict what the turnout will be. But comparing last year’s advanced ticket sales to this year, we’re actually ahead.”

The fair sold more advanced tickets Wednesday than they did last year, Troxler said, and those numbers had set a record high last October.

He attributes the preliminary success to people who need a $7 relief from the economy’s burdens.

“This is the best entertainment value in the state,” he said. “Where else in North Carolina can you go to something like this with that kind of money?”

But because Troxler is overseeing the fair’s operation, he’s had to put part of his campaigning on hold — at least personal campaigning.

So he’s counting on volunteers like Larry Doub, a tobacco, soy bean and small grain farmer from East Bend, N.C., to carry out that campaign on the floor below him.

“I campaign for him because I’m a farmer and he’s a farmer,” Doub said, holding up a yellow tractor sticker carrying Troxler’s name.

Doub, standing near a wooden wagon that he said urges people to remember “what it was that made this country strong.” Doub met Troxler about 20 years ago when the latter organized a coalition of 500 North Carolina farmers to protest legislation that kept tobacco profits from the farmers.

“We met out here at the fairgrounds,” Doub said. “I said, I don’t even know Steve Troxler, but we’re doing this and we’re going.

“We were just a bunch of young fools then. It felt good, though.”

Since then, Doub said he has become good friends with Troxler, who also helped get a student of Doub’s Hunter’s Safety Team through to the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colo.

“One of these days, he’ll be a general,” Doub said of the student.

But the atmosphere isn’t just about November’s election. Beside Doub’s station, four members from the Agricultural Institute Club are vending white and chocolate milk for 75 cents.

“We work both weekends every year,” Kayce Shehan, a second year Agricultural Institute student in livestock and poultry management, said. “It’s going good. It’s been steady today.”

The club has been selling Maola milk at the State Fair for 20 years, according to club member Thomas Cobb, a sophomore in livestock and poultry management and agricultural business.

“It’s a typical day at the fair,” Cobb, who said he has come to the fair for about 10 years, said.

The Dairy Council gives the club a portion of their profits, Shehan said. Cobb said they will use those profits for club activities.