Lake County Fair

Three connected barns stand on the Lake County Fairgrounds in Ronan, next door to Ronan High School on Third Street: the Arena Barn, the Beef Barn and the Sheep/Swine Barn. In the last week of July they take in cattle, chickens, pigs and sheep. The other buildings take exhibits of what the Lake County Leader in 2024 listed as “everything from flowers to chocolate-chip cookies.” The 2026 fair ran July 25 to August 1 under the theme “Stars, Stripes and Summer Nights.” Open Class is open to every resident of Lake County, and 4-H, FFA and youth group members may enter it alongside their own divisions.

The grounds serve the whole county: Arlee, Charlo, Hot Springs, Pablo, Polson, Ravalli, St. Ignatius and Ronan. The county’s own list adds Dixon, and the Glacier Country tourism listing adds Sćilíp.

Swine at eight, crab at five

The 2026 schedule opened with the horse show at 9 a.m. on Saturday, July 25. The MBHA barrel race followed at 9 a.m. Sunday, and at noon came an event the printed schedule names only as “Shotgun.” The dog show began at 8 a.m. Tuesday and the cat show at 10. From Tuesday the 4-H and Open Class exhibits were open to view.

Wednesday belonged to the livestock:

• swine at 8 a.m., in market, showmanship and breeding classes
• sheep from 1 to 3
• goats at 4
• market beef at 6 in the evening

A Kid Zone opened the same morning and ran from 9:30 to 5 each day through Saturday.

Beef and dairy breeding and showmanship took Thursday morning. Fashion judging came at 2 p.m. and the fashion show at 4:30. The Buyers Appreciation Dinner sat down at 5:30. At 7 p.m. came the Market Livestock Sale, where 4-H and FFA members sell their market animals.

Friday moved to the smaller stock: rabbits at 9 a.m. and poultry from 11:30 to 2:30. The Large Animal Round Robin followed at 3 and the Adult Showmanship Contest at 4:30. At 5 p.m. the Ronan Chamber of Commerce held its Crabfest on the grounds. The county’s photographs of the event carry captions such as “Hort barn crab fest” and “Crabfest Beth Preston and friends.” The Small Animal Round Robin went on at 6, and a teen dance began at 7.

Saturday opened with the Fair Fun Awards Ceremony at 10. From noon to 2 came the Kiddie Slicker Rodeo, the rodeo for the youngest visitors. Commercial booths stand through the week, and the Fair Board’s premium book asks patrons to visit them “and welcome them as part of the Fair program.”

The rodeo the Friends brought back

The Pioneer Days Committee announced that it would hold no rodeo in 2026. According to the Lake County Leader’s Emily Messer, “the public cried out.” A month before the fair, the Friends of the Fairgrounds and the Lake County Fair Board announced that they would put one on themselves.

Mike Lien, the key organizer, called LKC Rodeo Productions. That outfit supplied the stock, panels, gates, chutes and pens. The Pioneer Days Committee stayed on to run the concessions and a beer garden.

The rodeo weekend opened on Friday night with an Iron Cowgirl Challenge of breakaway roping, barrel racing and a goat tie. Two open performances followed, at 6 p.m. on Saturday, August 1, and at 3 p.m. on Sunday, August 2. General admission was $15, military veterans paid $10, and children five and under got in free. The fair took a dollar off for each of three things, up to $3:

• wearing a hat and boots
• wearing red, white and blue
• bringing non-perishable food

Messer’s photographs show children holding the fence for a better view as the sun set over the grounds on Saturday. They also show bull riders, and full grandstands. On Sunday, Ella Knoll’s hat flew off during her bronc ride, and JD Edwards held tight as a bronc tried to throw him.

Lien had never helped organize a rodeo before. “But it was worth it. I’m glad I did it,” he told the Leader. “I knew it’d be some work, but you just don’t realize … holy cow, there’s a lot of work.” He credited the sponsors, the fair board, committee helpers, his wife, Sheri Lien, and his children.

Sjaan Vincent, the fairgrounds manager, said the rodeo could not have happened without “the outpouring of community support.” She summed up the weekend this way: “The weather was perfect, the food was great and the rodeo stock was awesome.”

Lien said the intention is to hold a rodeo again the next year, and that it would “definitely” come up at the next fair board meeting. The Pioneer Days Committee, for its part, plans to return to rodeo on its own new property, the Mission Range Event Center west of Ronan. It is writing grants and raising money to build an arena there.

Sjaan Vincent’s grounds

In July 2024 the Leader found Vincent helping a crew of young workers build a fence before the fair. They measured and set the rails, then painted them brown. She manages the county-owned grounds year-round. During the fair her work includes scheduling, recruiting and orienting judges, and readying the buildings for animals.

“I’ve been involved since I was 9 years old at some level,” she said. “Whether I was being a 4-H kid or a 4-H leader, a 4-H Council member and a Fair Board member, and now, managing the whole thing.”

Besides the barns, the campus holds:

• the Community Center, with its kitchen, north and south meeting rooms and two courtyards
• a large arena and a small one for livestock
• a 40-by-100-foot event building, listed as the Lundvall North Event Space
• a concession stand with its own kitchen, built so that more than one event can run at once

Outside fair week the grounds host the Chainsaw Carving Rendezvous, the Summer Solstice Brewfest, and the Lights Under the Big Sky display strung along the barns and fences. They also host wedding receptions, funerals and banquets. From October to February, 4-H shooting sports move indoors: archery in the horticulture barn, and pistol and air rifle in the Community Center. “I don’t know another facility anywhere that allows that,” Vincent said.

In 2024, federal funding secured by Lake County replaced plumbing and electrical work more than 50 years old, most of it installed by volunteers. That year also brought several other improvements:

• a 75-foot concrete patio along the north side of the Community Center
• power in each livestock barn
• a new heating and cooling system for the Community Center
• a 100-kilowatt generator, then slated for installation, that Vincent said could run the entire grounds in a disaster

Vincent credits the vision of retired Extension Agent Jack Stivers. “He just wanted a very attractive community space,” she said. “And we, over the years, have taken our little bitty fair budget and worked toward that.” She quotes the fair board’s vice chair, Cynthie Preston: “We’re not the biggest fairgrounds in the world, but we’re probably the cutest.”

From a Chautauqua tent at Polson

Lake County was created in 1923. The City of Polson’s history says it was formed from parts of Missoula and Flathead counties. Distinctly Montana gives the date as May 11, 1923, and adds Sanders County to the list. Polson and Ronan both sought the county seat. By the magazine’s account, Polson had roughly twice Ronan’s population and won.

The first annual Lake County Fair was held at Polson, opening on October 9. It was advertised as the “Greatest Exhibition of Flathead Products Ever Held.” Grains, grasses, vegetables, Flathead fruit, domestic arts, dairy products and livestock filled a large Chautauqua tent, and there were balloon ascensions with a triple parachute drop. On September 26, 1925, the first annual dairy stock sale at the fair in Polson was advertised to begin at 1:00 p.m. A GoGood Travel listing, which refers to the 2008 fair book, calls the fair “a 70 year Tradition.”

At Ronan, the Horticulture Building went up in 1961 with the block restroom building. It held horticulture and home economics projects during the fair. Having few amenities, it stood empty the rest of the year, and it later served as a bus barn for the Ronan School District.

The fair budget could not cover major projects, so in 2011 the Friends of the Fairgrounds formed to raise money. In 2016 the Friends were given the old barn to rebuild as a year-round community building. They added seven trusses to stabilize it, along with new doors, insulation, a ceiling, lighting, heaters and a rustic finish for the walls. Now called the RE-Barn, it holds shooting sports practice, dog training, baseball practice, wedding receptions, funerals and educational presentations. Among the county’s photographs of it are one captioned “Mission Valley Mariners winter practice” and another, from before the work began, captioned “Courtyard as a driveway 2008.”