The Fair

“Getting a six-horse team ready, you’re always on edge,” says Fred Polinder Jr., who first drove at the fair in 1947 when he was 18 years old. “But the minute you step up on the seat and gather up the lines all the butterflies are gone.” Here, his grandson Courtney Polinder steers his team of Clydesdales at a grandstand show with his wife, Heidi, next to him on the driver’s seat. Photo by Mike Urban

Fair fact: In 1955, a fourth day was added to the fair and a tractor-driving contest was started.
Days til fair: 193
Weather: Some sun!

All’s fair

If you’re thinking Super Bowl, you’re thinking beer. So you might be thinking Budweiser … and then you can’t help but think Budweiser Clydesdales. Did you know the Budweiser Clydes debuted in 1933 to celebrate the end of Prohibition? A couple of years later, in 1935, the fair introduced draft horse pulling, offering prizes of $15, $10 and $5. The six-horse hitch teams started up around 1946, when the fair resumed after World War II.

So here’s our Super Bowl connection: Bet you didn’t know that Frank Verduin, a farmer from Lynden, trained the Budweiser teams? “He went to the work with the Budweiser team in the mid-50s in St. Louis,” says his son, Noel Verduin, who still drives the Crazy Eights in the fair every year. “He broke some of the horses for them, he was one of the crew.”

Besides this page from the past, the fair can boast a current semi-Super Bowl connection. Alan Manning, a Blaine farrier who shoes most of six-horse hitch teams you see at the fair, also travels the country as one of the Budweiser Clydesdales’ handlers.

What’s more, Craig Shagren of Shagren’s Belgians in Custer was scouted to drive for the brewery team. But he turned it down because he didn’t want to spend time away from his family, according to the fair’s grandstand announcer Rick Holleman. That’s like Jake Locker telling the Tennessee Titans, thanks, but he’ll take a pass.

So if you think the Super Bowl is special, just know that you can see that same kind championship-quality driving at every fair.

Trivia: What’s your favorite Budweiser Clydesdale commercial? How about “Hank the Clydesdale” where the horse trains like Rocky to make the team?

See you at the fair!
Sarah Eden Wallace