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QuickTake:
Young attendees of the fair are often the children of workers and vendors. Growing up attending the fair gives them opportunities to learn essential skills and gain lifelong connections.
Lifted above the crowd of the Oregon Country Fair, Adelynn, 5, and Soren, 7, rode on their parents’ shoulders in a loud procession of highlighter green.
The Lime Green Parade is one of the annual traditions at fair that for some could be overwhelming. But Adelynn and Soren were right at home amid the noise and the bubbles and the dancing.
Their parents, Katie Markley and Nathaniel Wendt, have come to the fair for a combined total of more than 30 years as workers, and the girls have been going since they were babies. Markley and Wendt have noticed the interpersonal skills that their children have picked up by being at the fair every year, as well as the confidence, creativity and community the girls have gained.
“I feel like when I’m at fair, everybody’s just there to love me,” Soren recently said to Markley.
Built as an event that invites adults to feel like children again, the Oregon Country Fair offers kids of fair workers a community and chances to learn and grow. In between the moments of whimsy, fair kids also contribute to the massive task of running the wooded wonderland.
Kids at work
A crew of three 8-year-old boys wearing matching Lamine Yamal soccer jerseys sat at the Youth Power tent Friday morning eating peaches.
Otus, Asa and Malaki were about to head out to “bulldog.” Bulldogging is kid security, Otus explained. They check fairgoers’ bracelets at private camp entrances to ensure they have the required bead to enter the camp. In exchange for their services, the fair pays them $5 an hour.
Shontell Truevette, 60, has organized the Youth Power initiative at the fair for 16 years. It’s meant to engage kids aged 8 to 13 whose parents work at the fair.
The kids report to her, and she assigns them odd jobs like watering the dirt pathways in order to keep the dust down and doing junior security tasks. The kids have the responsibility of filling out time sheets in order to make their money.
“We pitch it as presecurity training,” Truevette said. “Ideally, we’re inspiring them to learn how to give back to the fair.”
Along the paths of vendor stalls, kids also sell their own crafts.
Riley, 11, and Sylvan, 7, sat cross-legged on the ground across the path from their mom’s crystal stand with their friend Shairee, also 11. Strewn out in front of them were their wares — Riley and Shairee sold handmade jewelry, squishy fidgets and drawings while Sylvan sold LEGO people with various combinations of legs, torsos and heads he puts together himself.
The Corvallis kids have come every year since they were toddlers. Shairee was excited about buying her own food with the money she made this year, a new form of independence.
“I can eat whatever I want,” she said, proudly.
Freedom to be a kid
In Wally’s Way, the most kid-focused section of the country fair, Maya Rios was finishing her shift work with her two children, Raymi, 3, and Wilca, 6.
Rio, 38, is impressed by the fair’s commitment to kid safety. Everyone who works in the fair’s free childcare area undergoes a background check, and other workers are dedicated to making sure there are no hidden spaces and dead zones where staff can’t monitor what’s happening around the fair.
It’s not easy having kids at any large festival, Rio said, but the Country Fair is more welcoming and family-friendly than most places in everyday life.
“There are very few places, at least in America, that I’ve experienced where kids are welcome to be here as they are,” she said.
She and her kids camp at the fair and their camp neighbors are always understanding of middle-of-the-night crying and spurts of high energy during the day. Older fair workers tell her stories of when their kids were young and that they’re just happy to see the next generation of fair attendees.
“Instead of at the grocery store where your kid starts crying and everybody’s looking at you, like, ‘What are you doing?’ I look up and all these parents are smiling at me knowingly,” Rio said. “I get so much encouragement. They’re just like, ‘You’re doing so good, Mama.’”
Rio, who works in the crew that’s responsible for how the fair looks, said the fair is designed to be a wholesome and nourishing place where adults can be childlike as well.
“I really think everyone benefits,” she said. “It’s pretty special.”
