Our Man in Arlington

I plan to be on vacation for the next two weeks and will have to forego the pleasure of writing this column. Therefore, I thought a prospective column would be in order, rather than the retrospective fare you usually get.

The subject is the 28th annual Arlington County Fair being held from Thursday, August 19 through Sunday, August 22. The message is that you should not miss it!

The fair is being held at the Thomas Jefferson Community Center in the very heart of Arlington. The center is located on South Second Street, one block from the intersection of South Second Street and Glebe Road and two blocks from the major Glebe Road-Arlington Boulevard intersection. Festivities will begin with a ribbon-cutting ceremony on Thursday evening at 6:15 p.m. (the outdoor rides will begin at 5 p.m.) and end with the closing of the outdoor activities at 10 p.m. Sunday night (the indoor activities will close at 5 p.m.)

Sponsors of the fair other than Arlington County and its various agencies include the Sun-Gazette newspaper, Comcast, Commuter Page.com, Ballston Common Mall, ABC Channel 7, News Channel 8, and the Ballston-Virginia Square Partnership.

I was chair of the county Planning Commission when the fair began in 1976. The big question in our mind was whether we could pull off a traditional county fair in an urban county. County fairs in most people’s minds were country affairs with country people in attendance. Would “sophisticated” urbanites be interested?

You bet they would be. They turned out in droves from the beginning, and the fair has grown into one of the defining events of the county.

The focal point of the fair is the wide array of outdoor rides, led by a great Ferris wheel, brought to us by the same outfit that produces the great Cole Brothers-Clyde Beatty Circus. Then, of course, there is a traditional fairway, excluding strippers and freak shows, that many of us enjoyed when we were kids – along with all sorts of food of a multitude of ethnic varieties including good old hamburgers, hot dogs and Pennsylvania Dutch fennel cakes. There will be pig and goat races, pony rides, and a real, live petting zoo, too.

And, of course, live entertainment. I don’t have a list, but it has always been good.

It would not be a county fair if we didn’t have judged competitions. Arlington doesn’t have any farms (I think!), so we won’t have live animal competitions. But there will be everything else from honey, bees wax, baked goods, vegetables, herbs and nuts to crafts, fine arts, photography, flower arrangements, and ceramics.

The county government will be there, too, with booths describing Arlington’s myriad of county services – including demonstrations of fire equipment and vehicles, always a crowd pleaser at any county fair – urban or rural. Most of Arlington’s civic, fraternal, commercial, and nonprofit organizations sponsor booths, too.

This is all great. But the best part of the whole event to me is the unparalleled opportunity to see the whole Arlington community gathered together in all its richness and diversity. It is a great experience.

A word of warning, however. Parking around the community center will be a bear. You probably will want to consider using county-provided shuttle services from various parking facilities around the county. You can learn about the location of these shuttle services, as well as a great deal more about the fair, by going to the fair’s website at www.arlingtoncountyfair.org.

I hope to see you all there.