Fifteenth annual year book— part hi 191 



repealed and the matter left with the board of supervisors to make 

 an appropriation, but you will never get it by taxes. I would like 

 to hear from anyone here that ever knew a proposition of that kind 

 to be carried. I was talking with Mr. Stansbury of Mason City. 

 He said it .looked just like "getting money from home," and after 

 the vote was taken it was nine to one against it. You all know 

 you can't go out and submit it to the voters and expect them to 

 sanction a taxable proposition because all the different local in- 

 terests spring up and will be against you. But you can go to the 

 board of supervisors, a body of only three to five men, and explain 

 to them what the county fair is doing for the county, how it is 

 improving the stock and building the county up ; that it is a mighty 

 good thing and you might get an appropriation of a thousand dol- 

 lars, when you would never get it if you left it to the vote of the 

 taxpayers. 



Mr. R. W. Schug, Strawberry Point: Mr. Chairman: I am 

 certainly not opposed to state aid for county fairs. In fact, I 

 would like to see the legislatures pass a bill allowing county fairs 

 at least one half the amount that they pay out for premiums. But 

 I believe there is a lot of good argument in some of the remarks 

 made by Mr. Bradley. I think any county fair that depends on 

 state aid to make a success cannot be called a success. If the 

 county fair cannot sustain itself without the state aid they are 

 not managing it properly. That is not saying that we would not 

 accept state aid, if we got it. But take, for instance, our fair. 

 The last few years, up till four years ago, the management made 

 every effort to pay off whatever debt there was on the property 

 and they cut down on their entertainments and the attendance 

 dwindled down until our fair was near ' ' busted. ' ' We were practi- 

 cally out of debt, but we had no fair left. We have a property 

 there worth eight or nine thousand dollars. The grounds, without 

 any improvements on, are worth $8,000. We went to work and put 

 up a new horse barn two years ago, I guess about as good a barn 

 as you will find on most of the county fair grounds; built new 

 fences, put an addition to the amphitheater, put in a new double 

 deck judges' stand, a ladies' and gentlemen's toilet and permanent 

 waterworks, and the association is three thousand dollars in debt. 

 Some would say that was not a success, but I can show you to the 

 contrary. We put up over $4,000 worth of improvements the last 

 three years, and are still three thousand dollars in debt, but we 

 give the people a show for their money. We charge twenty-five 



