HAMILTON, Ohio – A lot of laughter, running, bouncing and tossing was happening on the last Friday of the Butler County Fair. It was Barnyard Rodeo Fun Day put on, for the first time ever, by the junior fair board. And Shelby McCoy, who had already shown her rabbit at the fair, was having a good time.

“We’re doing some fun activities – we have stick horse races, three-legged races, pin a tail on a horse or a goat or a pig, and a bean bag race,” McCoy said. “It’s been fun even though I haven’t won anything yet.”

The animal shows were over by Friday It was a quiet day with not a lot going on. In the past, farm bureau had hosted a fun day, but with COVID restrictions in place earlier in the year, they were ready for someone else to take over. When the fair was still in the planning stages, the junior fair board decided they would do that.

“We had a little bit of everything,” said Ryland Beckner, junior fair board vice president. “It was an event to get kids ages 5 to 19 out and having fun and being active. It was open to the general public. It’s the junior fair board’s first year to do this event so we were hoping for a good turnout. There were going to be plenty of prizes.”

They wanted to bring together some of the people who don’t always get to participate in the fair by showing animals, said junior fair board member Olivia Demoret.

“We wanted them to have some fun while they were here,” Dermot said. “Anybody and everybody who was here. We had like 130 kids take part. We plan on continuing this.”

Local businesses donated prizes, said Allie Parmin, another junior fair board member. As the kids played games, the workers gave them a ticket with a chance to win a prize.

“It was a better turnout than we hoped it would be,” Parmin said. “It was great and the junior fair board had fun working together. I know I have made some new friends myself and I was able to hang out with my friends I already have.”

Added Dermot: “We worked hard to get this as big as it is and I don’t think any of us imagined it would get this successful.”

Junior fair board members and participants all considered the day a success. The games worked out as the junior fair board had planned, Beckner said.

“Overall, it pretty much ended up being how we wanted it to be,” Beckner said. “We made it work. It was a great event to have; we had fun planning it and doing it. It was awesome to see this start out as an idea, and then it’s like, maybe we could do it, maybe we couldn’t, and then just like that, we were doing it. All of a sudden it’s the day of the event and you proceed with it and it goes pretty. It was pretty fun.”