Traveling Carnival News,Pictures and Videos.

Scott Lawrence – KFDM News

The South Texas State Fair has already broken a record and there are still seven days to go.

Chris Colletti with the Young Men’s Business League tells KFDM News yesterday’s attendance set a record for the first Sunday of any South Texas State Fair.

The YMBL is still calculating the numbers but Colletti says Saturday’s attendance was also impressive.

Rain on Thursday and Friday cut down on attendance and Colletti says they’re still playing catch up, but he says the YMBL is gaining ground.

The gates open today through Friday at 5 p.m., Saturday at 10 a.m. and Sunday at 11 a.m.

KFDM News will have live reports tonight at 5 and 6.

For more information about the South Texas State Fair log onto ymbl.org

Mesquite Local News

Royal West Amusements will be at Mesquite Days with new rides and old friends.

Nicholas Montoya, organizer of Mesquite Days, announced today that Royal West Amusements Carnival will be on site at their four day Festival this year with new rides to please event-goers.

The event will run from April 23 through April 26 at the Virgin River Convention Center parking lot (the Old Mesquite Star Hotel & Casino).

Royal West Amusement is the sister show of Inland Empire Shows, which has been the carnival pleasing families at this traditional event for the past few years.

The shows, each traveling with over 30 exciting rides, games and attractions, have switched their routes, bringing fresh new rides to the Festival.

The manager of the carnival show will be Todd Keenan.

According to Montoya, Royal West Amusements is the best value around and the safest carnival company in the business.

Owner and Operator Todd Keenan is proud of the steps his employees take every day to keep the rides running safely.

Two rolling shutdowns and inspections are done on each ride every full day while the show is running.

The shows have been awarded safety plaques from the national companies who insure them.

Keenan’s marketing team has a history of innovation in the Carnival business.

His was one of the first Carnivals to offer the Pay One Price (POP) ticket, and they innovated the Player’s Bonus Coupon, and Carnival Bucks, all designed to give the Festival attendees the best family fun deal around.

A limited number of these Advance Sale (POP) tickets are available at the Mesquite Recreation & Parks Department Administrative Offices, located at 100 W. Old Mill Road, during open hours.

These tickets will be on sale until Thursday, April 23, at 3 p.m. or until sold out.

Cash only.

by Gus Moore – MiamiBeach411.Com

The Miami-Dade County Fair and Exposition starts today and continues through April 12, but don’t be surprised if the annoying theme song keeps playing in your head through summer… it’s one of those jingles that will haunt you.

What ever you do, don’t let the theme song stop you from going. The Fair is a lot of fun. See for yourself in this short video of the 2008 Fair produced and narrated by Brad A Schenck:

An entrepreneur and tinkerer, the inventor worked to make crepes and pancakes, and to separate oil and water.

By TIM HARLOW, Star Tribune

There might not be a more quintessential food at the Minnesota State Fair than mini-doughnuts, and for that we can thank entrepreneur Edward M. Anderson.

A man who had an inquisitive mind and loved to tinker in his garage, Anderson invented the Lil’ Orbits automatic doughnut machine and perfected the batter that went with it.

“It’s kind of those Colonel Sanders secret recipes with 13 ingredients,” said Mike Foster, a business consultant for Anderson’s Plymouth-based firm. “He was a mechanical genius and an entrepreneur in the true sense of the word, and he put thousands of other entrepreneurs into business.”

Anderson died of cancer Thursday at his home in Plymouth. He was 78.

Anderson’s inventions also included automatic crepe- and pancake-making machines and accessories, Foster said. He also invented and patented an oil- and-water separator, which is used by many companies to clean up pollutants, said Anderson’s son, Charlie, of Brooklyn Park.

Born in New York, Anderson earned a degree in political science from Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania. He started his career in 1956 as a public relations writer for the American Petroleum Institute in New York. He then went to Philadelphia, where he directed marketing and managed sales staff as CEO of Edwards, Roberts & Edwards.

In 1974 he founded Lil’ Orbits in New Hope and began designing and patenting an extensive line of doughnut-makers. With the advent of the Internet, sales of the machines went worldwide, and Anderson was recognized by former President George W. Bush with the “E” award for outstanding export sales. In 2005, he was recognized as the outstanding businessman of the year for Minnesota by the Republican National Congressional Committee and the Business Advisory Council.

Anderson, who was still active in his company until about a week before his death, was “one of those guys who moved the place forward at all costs,” said sales manager Brian O’Gara.

By Joe Kimball – MinnPost.Com

Kids with 4-H projects in Washington County get one more shot at blue ribbons in the State Fair competition, but after this year, the county’s funding of the program is finished, the county board decided.

The Stillwater Gazette reports that the board voted 4-1 Tuesday to eliminate two full-time program coordinator positions as of Sept. 15, which will save $37,684 in 2009 and about $130,000 in future years.

Commissioner Lisa Weik, of Woodbury, dissented, saying she would have rather seen the county continue to fund one 4-H coordinator until the group could find a more sustainable funding plan.

4-H supporters said they were saddened but not surprised by the board’s decision. They’ll start looking for other ways to fund the program.

Commissioners said they recognize the value local 4-H clubs bring to the community, but there is simply no room for non-essential services in the county’s ever-tightening budget. If the organization is to continue in its present form, it will have to find other means of support.

BY LAURA MORALES – Miami Herald

Get ready to spin until you’re sick, shoot at moving targets with water guns, and cram your face with roasted corn, funnel cakes and candy apples.

One of the first rides to be seen rising from the fair grounds is the giant wheel for the 2009 Miami-Dade County Fair and Expo in Miami. CHRIS CUTRO / FOR THE MIAMI HERALD

For the 58th year, the Miami-Dade County Fair & Exposition is springing up at the corner of Coral Way and Southwest 107th Avenue. Laborers already have been at work assembling food kiosks, game booths and 90 midway rides for opening day Thursday.

The fair is introducing some new attractions this year to lure customers.

Saturday, local youngsters between the ages of 9 and 18 who fancy themselves the next Kelly Clarkson or Clay Aiken can put themselves at the mercy of judges for the new Tween Idol singing competition.

Participants must prove their vocal chops before a panel that includes Miami’s Syesha Mercado, a finalist on the seventh season of American Idol and Grammy-winning singer Albita.

Those chosen as finalists will return March 29 to compete for a trip to Los Angeles to see American Idol live, an appearance on WSVN-Fox 7′s Deco Drive and have the chance to sing the fair’s jingle, Be There, in next year’s ad campaign. Contestants can register at WSVN.com or fairexpo.com.

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by: ccruiserboyy – Content Caboodle

Cotton candy – what would childhood be without it? It’s sticky, sweet airiness brings memories of summer days spent under the circus tent, or meandering through the country fair’s exhibits. Let’s not forget nights sent on the carnival’s Ferris wheel, cotton candy in one hand while the other grips the car’s bar for dear life.

Cotton candy goes back a long way, though, from its appearance at fairs and carnivals. It wasn’t the light, airy, wispy stuff we know today, but spun sugar was all the rage in the days of knights and their fair damsels. Since sugar was rare and expensive, it was a treat reserved only for the very rich, so few folks ever got to experience it. Medieval cooks first spun sugar on forks to create webs and strands to decorate cakes and other sweets. Confectioners would make castles and dragons and fairy tale creatures from it to the delight of the rich and famous of the day. Lords and ladies would marvel over the spun sugar creations, while the lowly servants could only look on with longing.

Later, cookbooks shared the techniques involved in spinning sugar. Most involved swirling a fork into the sticky cooked sugary syrup and drawing it out at just the right time to create the right thickness of sugar thread. These threads were then spun or wound around an upturned bowl. In the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, spun sugar was again the rage in Europe, with confectioners creating sugar Easter eggs and covering other candies such as chocolate in intricate webs of spun sugar. This was pretty much how cotton candy (called spun sugar) existed until the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

No one can really say for sure who “invented” cotton candy as we know it today. Four separate individuals – Thomas Patton, Josef Delarose Lascaux, John C. Wharton, and William Morrison – all had a hand in it, it would seem.

In 1899, John Wharton and William Morrison were granted a patent for a machine that melted and spun the sugar. The pair of Nashville, TN candy makers then got really creative. They introduced their “fairy floss” and its electronic maker at the Louisiana Purchase Exhibition, otherwise known as the St. Louis World’s Fair, in 1904, and the tradition of cotton candy and fairs was born. They sold nearly 69,000 boxes of the stuff at 25 cents each. It was one of the Fair’s most expensive treats, earning the two men over $17,000, nearly half a million dollars in today’s world.

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Ray Malerbi – http://thepinetree.net

[Statement from Boyd Jensen, Spokesman from the California Portable Ride Operators Association (CalPRO) regarding the release of the investigative findings of the Department of Industrial Relations, Amusement Ride Unit respecting the Calaveras County Fair incident May 16th, 2008.] Regarding the DOSH report the most salient facts are that (1) “There was no evidence that operator error contributed to the accident or its severity” (p. 75 DOSH Report.) (2) The California State Amusement Ride Inspection Unit…..

inspected this Yo-Yo ride on multiple occasions and approved it for operation
prior to its being offered to the public (p. 9 DOSH Report et. seq.) (3) The Yo-Yo Ride has been improved so that this cannot happen again. The mechanical failure causing this incident was fixed by the ride manufacturer with the addition of a simple gauge plate, cap screws, washers and safety wire (p 53 DOSH Report) – estimated at about $20 worth of hardware. Since September 4, 2008 this modification is required on all Yo-Yo rides.

The Calaveras County Fair and Jumping Frog Jubilee, have an extraordinary
history of safety and care for all those who attend its Fair each year. Brass Ring Amusements dba Midway of Fun has operated rides all over the state of
California to many thousands of people and its rides are inspected by both
private and California State Inspectors so they operate safely. It is unquestioned that the carnival ride operators of the state of California have an outstanding safety record exceeding every other form of amusement including permanent amusement rides at parks. It is unquestioned that unexpected incidents can occur in spite of safety precautions being taken and excellent ride designs and operations. Every time incidents like this do happen everyone in the amusement industry feels sorrow and wants to do everything they can to support those injured and make sure similar incidents are not repeated.

Scott Lawrence – KFDM News

Volunteers are getting ready to put together the pieces of the South Texas State Fair.

The fair begins Thursday, March 26 and runs through April 5 at Ford Park.

The YMBL board voted to move the fair to March after Hurricane Ike prevented the event from taking place in its usual time period in October

Truck drivers are bringing in some of the rides for the Bill Hames Midway and organizers expect hundreds of thousands of visitors.

YMBL Fair Chairman Donnie Warner tells KFDM News volunteers will be busy this week. Vendors begin checking in Sunday and volunteers will work throughout the day to prepare the fairgrounds.

By Adrian Lennox – http://www.interpark.co.uk

Heavily involved in an as-yet-unnamed theme park that is being developed in China, Fabbri Group has announced it is moving into the realm of consultancy and masterplanning.

The coy Italian amusement rides manufacturer said it will deliver eight rides in total to a “complete new park” to be opened later this year in China.

The resort will consist of an amusement park, two five-star hotels, golf courts, restaurants, luxury bungalows and a multiplex shopping mall.

The rides to be supplied by Fabbri include an 85-metre Giant Wheel, a Bounce Tower, a Splash Battle ride and a Helisky ride

Fabbri said it has offered a total service in not only manufacturing the rides but also in offering a consultancy service, delivering a “total masterplan” for the park.

“Fabbri has stepped into the consultancy for parks in order to improve the service towards their clients without needing an external company in this way increasing the cost for the client,” the group said.