Days of '85 Fair & Rodeo

Sunday on Main Street

At 11 a.m. on Sunday, Aug. 9, 2026, the Days of ‘85 Parade came down Main Street in Ekalaka. It brought floats, antique vehicles, businesses, 4-H clubs, and the classes of 1966, 1976 and 1986, entered as class reunions. First place among the antique tractors went to Doug Van Dyken’s 1958 Ford 801. His wife, Leah (Brence) Van Dyken, drove it, and Doug rode along in the bucket. Behind it came a 1951 International Model C and a 1928 Allis Chalmers Model E. Two Model T Fords from the Rex McCord family, a 1924 and a 1925, shared a four-way tie in the vintage classic category with a 1960 Thunderbird and a 1955½ GMC. The Carter County Museum won the organization class. The Puptown Wranglers 4-H Club placed first among youth groups, with the Gumbo Gophers second.

The parade falls on the last day of Carter County’s fair week, which in 2026 ran Aug. 6 to 9 under the theme “Hogs, Horses and History, Celebrating 250 Years in the USA.” That Sunday began with a pancake breakfast at 8 a.m. at the TSO Triangle and a church service at 9 at Ekalaka Track and Arena. After the parade there were a barbecue, kids games, and frog and turtle races at the Triangle. The 4-H and FFA awards were given at the fairgrounds, and the Ekalaka Masonic Lodge held a barbecue and open house. The car and tractor show at the fairgrounds included a ranch pickup category, and the fair board posted its rules: “Enter it AS IS! Don’t clean it out. Don’t wash it.” The post went on: “Cow slobber welcome,” and “Dog hair? Even better.”

Shows, suppers and a street dance

The fair building opened for exhibits on Monday, Aug. 3. The animals arrived Thursday, when the swine show began at 8 a.m. at the fairgrounds. The rabbit and poultry shows followed at 10, while indoor exhibits were judged in the closed fair building. At 11 the Rene LaBree Memorial Sheep Dog Trials ran at Ekalaka Track and Arena, and the cat and dog show started at 1. Friday brought the horse show, the third annual Town of Ekalaka Sand Volleyball Tournament in the town park, the museum’s Science Friday, a pet parade, and the sheep and goat shows. That evening the fireman’s barbecue ran from 4 to 7 at the new fire hall. A cornhole tournament started at the TSO Triangle, and a keg toss began on Short Street. “The Pauls” played a free show at the fairgrounds at 7:30, and the Carter County 4-H Ambassadors held a kids dance afterward.

Saturday opened with the beef show. Free laser tag and mini golf ran at the fairgrounds, and the Bump-N-Run started at the airport. At 3 p.m. the 4-H/FFA Livestock Market Sale began, with a prime rib dinner afterward at the TSO Triangle. Indian tacos were served from 4 to 7 at St. Elizabeth Lutheran Church, and a kids zone stayed open on Main Street until 11. At 8 the Pauls led a gospel sing at First Baptist Church. At 9 a band called “Sideways” played a street dance on Main Street. Through the week the library held a silent auction alongside the Custer County Traveling Art Show, and the museum stayed open 9 to 5. Food vendors on the grounds were the Wagon Wheel Cafe, T’s Traveling Table, Bogey BBQ and Fluff N Stuff.

The fair board in 2026 was Seth Whitney, chair; Cam LaBree, vice chair; Robin Kawecki, Clay Smith, Rachel DeFord and Tessa Tauck; and Joni Hendricks, clerk and secretary. After the fair, the board’s own post described each member. Cam LaBree was “somehow about five steps ahead of the rest of us.” Seth Whitney was “the man with ALL the tools.” Robin Kawecki kept the grounds cleaned up well into the night. Clay Smith was the one who kept them laughing. Tessa Tauck was the newest member and a 4-H mom. Rachel DeFord had won a buckle as Old Dog Grand Champion Showman in the adults’ round robin. Joni Hendricks was “Past, present, and apparently future secretary,” and Jimmie Sparks, a former secretary, stayed on as her assistant.

Two rodeos at Ekalaka Track and Arena

The first rodeo began at 5 p.m. Saturday, after barrel slack that started at 1. The second began at 2 p.m. Sunday and closed with a Grand Finale Ride for the top four saddle bronc riders. Over the two days contestants entered barrel racing, team roping, ranch bronc, saddle bronc, calf roping, steer wrestling, goat tying, ladies and senior men’s breakaway, and bull riding. Guy Lesh, Garrett Lesh and Justin King won the wild cow milking. Kinch Rost won the bull riding both days, with scores of 69 and 72. On Sunday Kayden Wood won the saddle bronc with a 74 and the Wild Ride with an 88. Carlee Miller ran Sunday’s barrels in 16.314 seconds and tied her goat in 7.69.

A post office in 1885, a fair in 1955

The celebration takes its name from 1885, the year a post office was started in Ekalaka. The Carter County Museum counts that as the moment the town gained its identity. In the museum’s telling, the town’s celebrations were later put on hold for more pressing matters, such as the second World War, and Days of 85 began when there was more time for jubilation. The museum’s collection includes a photograph of a Carter County Fair exhibit from 1922 and pictures of floats in the street parade at the 1935 Ekalaka Jubilee.

The fullest account of the fair comes from Zelzo Hedges, in Volume 1 of Shifting Scenes. “There had been no fairs in connection with the rodeos or Days of 85 celebration for some time,” Hedges wrote, “but after considerable effort on the part of a few, the Fair was once more revived in 1955.” The County Commissioners appointed a board of Clarence Crystal, Bud Asbury, Mrs. Effie Brewer, Ivan Jardee and Frank Arbuckle. Clerk and Recorder Ray Nickerson and County Agent Gene Hoff also worked to restart the fair. Crystal was made chairman because of his work. Mrs. Frank Buck took charge of the exhibits, which were shown in the Old Charters building. The livestock stayed in pens under a tent between the courthouse and the Grade School. Feek and Ernest Tooke leased the arena from the county and put on the rodeo, and the Chamber of Commerce ran the parade. The event, held July 30 and 31, 1955, was billed as the first fair in many years and as Ekalaka’s seventieth birthday.

The next year an exhibit hall went up at the fairgrounds, and the old race barns were cleaned and put back in use. A year later the barns were torn down and replaced with sheep pens and cattle and horse barns. The Carter County Belles have sponsored the Rodeo Queen contest every year since 1964. Hedges, writing in 1975, noted that the Lions Club ran the one food stand on the grounds. Some churches moved their Sunday services so their congregations could watch the parade. Ekalaka Track and Arena, Incorporated had sponsored the rodeo for a dozen years by then. That summer’s rodeo drew 210 contestants, fifty-two of them in the bareback riding and fifty in the bull riding.

For a number of years the parade had a clown named Albie. She was Alberta Pulse, who opened a beauty shop in 1954 and served Ekalaka as its hairdresser for 50 years. She died in 2020 at 93.

A white stud named Snowflake

Feek Tooke’s family moved to a ranch near Ekalaka when he was four. He went on to breed horses for bucking. The museum’s Tooke Bucking Horse Collection holds a 1954 photograph of Chub Askin riding Bald Hornet at the Ekalaka Days of 85. Bald Hornet had only four qualified rides in ten years of service, from 1954 to 1964.

The breeding behind such horses had been tested at the same celebration eight years before. In the winter of 1945–46, Feek and his son Ernest went to collect Snowflake, an albino Arabian stud of about 1,000 pounds. Snowflake kept jumping fences into the neighbors’ mares. Ernest later recalled that the yard was full of neighbors who had come “to make sure this horse left.” In 1946 three of the RCA’s top bareback riders, Gale Orr, Jack Buschbom and Ted Warhol, accepted Feek’s invitation to Ekalaka to watch him try Snowflake at the Days of ‘85.

Ernest Tooke described the ride in the film Feek’s Vision. He was sitting with Warhol on Sunday morning when Buschbom came by and said, “Gale drew that white stud.” When the gate opened, Orr had his feet over the horse’s shoulders to mark him out. “Snowflake reached down with his mouth and grabbed Gale’s foot, and then he just leaped straight up in the air, right in the gate, and spun about twice,” Ernest said. “Between the terrible bucking and getting chewed on, Gale didn’t last very long, and Snowflake kicked him in the back with both hind feet. Well, that was the only time that he ever bucked him. Well, that was enough.”