Weston County Fair

The Weston County Fairgrounds lie at 24 Fairgrounds Road, on the southern edge of Newcastle: arenas, barns, horse stalls, a show ring, and an event center with meeting and banquet space and a certified kitchen. Weston County is where the Black Hills of Wyoming meet the northern edge of the Thunder Basin National Grassland. For most of the year the fair’s own description of the grounds holds: typically a quiet place to spend the night. Tents and trailers are welcome, and travelers hauling livestock can arrange pens and box stalls through the Fairgrounds Office. During fair week the grounds fill to capacity.

From the parade to the Sunday rodeo

The fair opens with a parade through downtown Newcastle and closes with the second round of the Weston County Junior Rodeo the following Sunday. The 2026 fair ran July 25 through August 2. Parade entries lined up at Pinnacle Bank, on the east side of town, at 9 a.m. and moved off at 10 toward the Fairgrounds, under the sponsorship of the Newcastle Area Chamber of Commerce. That evening the tough trucks ran on the track. Sunday brought a cornhole tournament and pig wrestling in the Pig Pit. On Monday came a junior horse show in the Four Seasons Arena, a Cowgirl Triathlon in the grandstands arena, and a public fashion revue at the Senior Center, where the fabric, quilting, and knitting entries had been judged the week before. On Tuesday the 4-H and open dog show worked through Kilpatrick Park in the morning, and in the evening the Newcastle High School wrestlers served a feed in the grandstands ahead of a mini rough stock rodeo.

From midweek on, the barns set the pace. Rabbits were shown Wednesday morning and swine that night. Poultry followed Thursday morning, sheep and goats Thursday evening, and the junior and open beef show at 8 a.m. Friday in the show ring. In between, the schedule listed a pulled pork barbecue, flower show judging, goat roping, and an ice cream and pie social in Kilpatrick Park put on by the Natural Resource District. The fair office later posted that the District would serve its ice cream and pie at Thursday’s farmers market. On the evening of July 29 the office posted that weather had moved things to the Clay Ertman Memorial. On Thursday the farmers market and a robotics showcase shared Kilpatrick Park, and the Pinnacle Bank Ranch Rodeo filled the grandstands arena at 7.

Friday started with the Farm Bureau Federation pancake breakfast at 6 a.m. at the Ertman Memorial. A pet show followed, then a round robin contest. The Junior Livestock BBQ, sponsored by Ranchers’ Feed, came at 4:30, the Junior Livestock Sale at 6, and a dance in the Four Seasons Arena after that. The office’s announcement called it “Two-Steppin’.” On Saturday the junior rodeo began at 9 a.m. with heritage team roping to follow, while exhibitors collected their static entries from the event center. On Sunday the cowboy church service met in Kilpatrick Park at 7:30, the rodeo went off again at 9, and the awards were handed out at 1 p.m. “Another great Weston County Fair is in the history books!” the office posted that morning.

Children had bouncy houses and carnival games from Wednesday into Friday morning, free to the public through local businesses and the Friends of Fair. The 2026 fair also ran a duck hunt. Small ducks were hidden around the grounds, finders sent in selfies, and anyone holding a duck with a number on its bottom could turn it in at the office for a prize. “It was a lot of fun watching people look for the ducks and seeing the selfies,” the office wrote afterward.

The people who keep it going

The fair is run by the Weston County Fair Board. Its members serve staggered terms: Lindsey Guden, Francie Hamilton, Billy Jackson, Joseph Tedder, and Mason Kaiser, whose term runs to January 2031. Kami Lopez is the office contact on the state’s list of 2026 fair dates. The fair’s own account credits recent growth to families who juggle jobs, volunteer work, and their children’s 4-H and FFA projects, and it records a notable increase in the pee-wee show, the pre-4-H program, and the junior rodeo. The board’s page also notes that Donna (Baldwin) Hunt has taken the reins as Ms. Rodeo Weston County.

The grounds stay busy after August. In 2026 the tough trucks ran on Saturday nights until the last event of the season on September 19. A food bank truck came on September 17, and the Humane Society held a yard sale on October 3. The Friends of the Fair yard sale is set for October 30 and 31.

A rented hall and two hundred dollars

The fair counts its beginning from 1904. It was held off and on until 1909, again in 1915 and 1916, and from 1925 to 1928. In August 1915 the News-Journal told its readers, “No one or two men, or committee, can make a complete success of the county fair. It takes the co-operation of all to bring the greatest success.” The same issue urged exhibitors to mind the quality of their entries, since they might go on to the Wyoming State Fair.

Weston County got its first agricultural agent in 1917. Most of his work went to the County Council of Defense during the First World War, but he also started several 4-H clubs. In 1920 the county commissioners asked the agent to prepare an agricultural exhibit for the state fair, and the same was done in 1925, when the Weston County display stood at the Wyoming State Fair in Douglas. In 1927 the commissioners appropriated $200 for the county fair and the state fair exhibits, and they did the same in 1928. Merchants judged that sum too small and added $300. There were no fairgrounds yet, so a hall was rented. Entries ran to farm crops, vegetables, fruit, poultry, cooking, needlework, and 4-H projects.

Arthur Hay was county agent in 1928, and the fair’s history spells his name both Hay and Hays. He organized a county demonstration contest whose winners earned a trip to the state fair. He said the fair took more of his time than any other project, and that in its early years it was largely a community affair hosted by the Lions Club and the American Legion of Newcastle. The attractions were small crops and vegetables, and the only premiums were those donated by local merchants.

Thirty-six acres from Beatrice

The land came from the Kilpatrick brothers of Beatrice, Nebraska, former owners of the Cambria Fuel Co. The fair’s history places the gift at about the time of the rented hall. A 2020 News Letter Journal account, working from the paper’s November 15, 1935, edition, dates it to 1935 and describes it as a 36-acre tract given for the sole purpose of creating a local racing track. The 1935 story said, “This tract of land, which has been named as the ‘Kilpatrick Park,’ will be used annually for rodeos and other celebrations which will be held in Newcastle.” The county commissioners accepted the land on November 5, 1935, and their minutes read: “Be it further resolved, that said tract of land be now named, and henceforth be known as ‘Kilpatrick Park.’” County clerk Mary C. Titus signed the resolution, along with board chairman E.P. Johnson and commissioners T.M. Jessee and Wm. J. Dixon.

The fair as it is known today has been held on the donated ground since 1937. Its first beef show and livestock sale came in 1946. In 1948, 15 head of beef sold for an average of 43 cents a pound. By 1950 the fair drew more than 440 exhibits, and in 1954 the first Weston County Junior Rodeo was added. The fair’s history marks 1956 as a banner year, when Miss America, Sharon Kay Ritchie of Nebraska, came to give speeches and hand out awards, and thousands turned out for what was remembered as a “spectacular fair.”

The name behind the arena

According to Linda Hunt, a local history researcher, the tract was renamed the Weston County Fairgrounds not long after the gift, and the brothers’ name dropped out of use. Hunt found the 1935 resolution in old newspapers and commissioners’ minutes while working on history projects near the fairgrounds. She then worked with Nancy Darnell of the Weston County Friends of the Fair, and with the fair board, to give the name back. The grassy area in the center of the property, behind the arena, became Kilpatrick Park. With help from the Weston County Travel Commission and from Nancy and Donley Darnell, a sign was bought for the park’s center entrance.