Gem/Boise County Fair & Rodeo

Admission to the Gem/Boise County Fair is free. The gates open onto the Gem County Fairgrounds at 2199 South Johns Avenue in Emmett, the Gem County seat, thirty miles northwest of Boise on Highway 16. In 2026 the fairgrounds advised newcomers to start in the exhibit buildings. Open Class entries hang in the Expo Building, where community members show baking, photography, quilting, woodworking and art. Youth projects that do not involve animals go to Legacy Hall. For the 2026 fair the halls also carried patriotic decorations marking America’s 250th anniversary. Food and shopping vendors open at 11 a.m. each fair day, and in 2026 their stalls included western apparel, hats, boots and jewelry.

Between the halls and the barns are the hired attractions. The schedule lists Reptology Reptile Encounters each day and a featured act, Pirates Rebellion, from 1 to 9 p.m. In 2026 Pirates Rebellion was billed as a new interactive water experience with pedal boats and an obstacle course. By the fairgrounds’ own list, earlier fairs brought in paintball, a hypnotist, axe throwing, a magician, walking Transformers, kiddie rides and a western town. Personal pets are not permitted on the grounds while livestock is there. One part of the grounds was bare dirt eight years before an August 2026 post from the fairgrounds, which showed it planted to green grass and shade trees.

Show rings and the Saturday sale

Showmanship and quality classes run all fair week for horses, dogs, cats and pocket pets, alpacas and llamas, pack goats, dairy and market goats, swine, sheep, cattle and poultry. On the Wednesday of fair week, Open Class exhibits open to the public. The youth Fashion Revue and Boxed Dessert Auction takes place at 11 that morning, and the Ag Olympics competition runs at 7 that night.

Saturday morning begins with a buyers breakfast, followed by the Youth Livestock Sale, where exhibitors sell their market animals. A volunteer committee runs the sale. The fairgrounds wrote in 2026 that for many young sellers the money funds the next project and buys next year’s animal. At 7 that evening the livestock awards are presented and the Parade of Champions is held, ahead of the final rodeo.

By the board’s account, fair board chairman Dan Heaton spends fair week in the arena and behind the scenes rather than behind a desk. At the 2025 fair, volunteers from Emmett’s Rotary and Kiwanis clubs scanned tickets and kept the crowds supplied with food and drink.

Three nights of PRCA rodeo

The Black Canyon Stock Show & Rodeo is ticketed separately from the fair and fills the last three nights, with a pre-rodeo at 7 p.m. and the rodeo at 8. For years Emmett held its rodeos under the Idaho Cowboys Association. Rodeo director Matt Askew and the board then moved up to the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association, and Emmett held its first professional-level rodeo August 1–3, 2024.

“Just trying to make a great show so we can get a better contestant base,” Askew told KIVI. He placed the rodeo plainly on the circuit: “This is not the Snake River Stampede, the Eagle Rodeo, the Caldwell Night Rodeo. This is a cut-your-teeth rodeo.” Many of its riders are rookies. The program includes breakaway roping, “which a lot of PRCA rodeos don’t have,” Askew said. The pre-rodeo offers mutton busting and mini bareback, mini bull and mini saddle bronc riding for children growing into the sport. Thursday is Family Night, with discounted rodeo tickets.

The 2025 rodeo, PRCA-certified for a second year, ran July 31 through August 2. On Saturday the doors opened around 6 p.m., leaving time for food and for the livestock areas, where cattle and sheep were on display in the evening. That night was Patriot Night. The crowd came in red, white and blue, and a few veterans were honored before the first event. The card ran through bareback riding, steer wrestling, team roping, saddle bronc riding, tie-down roping, breakaway roping, barrel racing and bull riding. Two Emmett High School graduates took first place: Mason Yancy, of Elgin, Oregon, in bareback riding, and Caseyn Pearson, of Emmett, in saddle bronc. The band American Tradition played afterward. The 2027 rodeo is set for July 29–31, with fair events beginning July 24.

The name Black Canyon also belongs to the gorge on the Payette River, called for the huge black basalt rocks that once blocked travel up it. The Bureau of Reclamation completed a 183-foot irrigation dam there in 1924.

From Tom’s Cabin to South Johns Avenue

The first fair was held in 1915, near Tom’s Cabin. It later moved to the Emmett City Park and has been housed at various locations around the county. For the centennial in 2015, Rikki Ruiz, University of Idaho Gem County Extension educator, wrote that the fair started out mimicking the valley’s phases of agriculture. Homestead farms and ranches came first, then the orchards and canneries. In the early 1900s fruit packers had labeled the valley “Gem of Plenty” for its fertility.

According to Ruiz, the early fairs taught youth ways to improve the family farm and became the educational core of the 4-H program. She wrote that in 2015 the Gem County Extension Office was in its 65th year at its location on the fairgrounds, citing a 1950 report by former Extension agent Erling Johannsen. “Families gather for fair week as grandpas and grandmas fill the bleachers, each hoping their child takes home the prized ribbon,” she wrote.

Outside fair week, the Gem County Fair Board rents out the grounds year round: the horse racing track, arena, barns, buildings and training stables. They are used for motor sports, flea markets, play days and barrel races. In fall 2026 the newly painted Expo Building was readied for the Kickin’ Cowgirls Christmas Bazaar and the Festival of Trees.

A clown, a mule and a raccoon named Coonie

The Heath family’s tradition at the fair dates to 1949, when Harold “Curly” Heath, named for his curly hair, began working as a rodeo clown. He brought along Mini Pearl, a mule, and a pet raccoon called Coonie. Mini Pearl rode in the family car. His son Eddie recalled that when they forgot to roll the window down, her rear end sometimes went right through it. She lived to 46 and died in 1982, and Curly died in 1988. Eddie also told KIVI about the time he tried to bring home a rattlesnake: “My mom said ‘you can take that rattlesnake somewhere or I won’t be here’ well… mom stayed and the rattlesnake went.”

Eddie and his brother raised animals for the fair and took part in their father’s clown act. Eddie’s son Matt, the youngest of three boys and the only one drawn to rodeo, raised pigs in 4-H. He got on his first bull and steer at the Gem County Fair and competed from 1996 to 2013. Curly, Mini Pearl, Eddie and Matt have all been inducted into the Idaho Rodeo Hall of Fame. “It was very humbling being inducted into the hall of fame,” Matt said. “It’s my favorite week in Emmett.” His daughter has shown animals at the fair for seven years.

When Eddie Heath was named grand marshal, he said of the fair, “They’ve really, really changed it... for the better.” That same year, Matt asked Eddie’s grandson, Linkon, whether he wanted to enter the sheep riding. Asked what he would be doing at the rodeo, Linkon answered, “Riding sheep.”