This year's Roosevelt fair set to be a special one

Whether you call them “old-timers,” “senior citizens,” “pioneers,” or “golden-agers,” Roosevelt County has a long tradition of honoring its more seasoned residents each year at the county fair. 

This year is a little more special than usual, according to Karen Inge, vice president of the Pioneers’ Association of Roosevelt County, as it marks the 70th anniversary of the founding of this annual celebration. 

Instead of the usual two or three pioneer honorees, Inge said the organization has plans to recognize around a dozen this year from communities all over the county. 

She invites all of us — no proof of age required — to bring a salad or dessert for the luncheon and program that is scheduled to begin at noon on Thursday in the Jake Lopez building at the fairgrounds.  

Registration opens at 9 a.m.; if you’re 65 or older, you may enter the fairgrounds for free up until 1 p.m. that day.  

Inge loaned me a handwritten notebook with records going back for the last half century of these pioneer luncheons. 

That in turn sent me to the archives of the Portales Daily News and Portales Tribune from September of 1952, when the Roosevelt County fair had the first reunion of its oldest residents. 

The 1952 fair was dubbed the Jubilee Fair, according to those newspapers, in honor of the somewhat hazy 50th anniversary of the founding of Portales. 

In a “By the Way” column, Portales Daily News Editor Gordon Greaves noted that his newspaper was also publishing a special “golden jubilee edition” filled with county history. 

“The occasion for all this attention to the past is the Old Timers Day at the Roosevelt County Fair next Tuesday,” Greaves wrote. “An old-fashioned basket lunch will be spread at noon, and a lot of conversation is expected to drift to the homestead days.” 

Greaves offered a piece of sage advice for those who planned to attend. 

“Our only suggestion is that everyone bring along a bushel basket of black-eyed peas, and that everybody sit around and shell them,” he wrote. “We got some of our best yarns for this edition while shelling peas.” 

Whether or not anyone arrived bearing produce was not recorded, but the Portales Tribune reported afterward that the gathering was a “howling success,” even as rain forced a last-minute relocation to the Portales Junior High gymnasium. 

 “The radio announced the change from fair ground to the school building,” the Tribune reported, “but it is possible that some were unable to hear of the change in location and missed the great pleasures of the occasion.” 

With an indoor location, there are no needs for such worries this year — the 2022 lunch is on, rain or shine. 

But Greaves’ advice about the black-eyed peas?  

That’s still worth a listen. Save a pan for me. 

Betty Williamson suspects Roosevelt County old-timers don’t mind being rained out of anything. Reach her at:

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