Small Farmer’s Journal Auction & Swap 2009

by Lynn R. Miller of Singing Horse Ranch
photos by Kristi Gilman-Miller

The third week in April we took our Auction and Swap Meet to the Central Oregon farm town of Madras. In what should be a textbook example of the best sort of smart small town economic development efforts, Jefferson County and the Madras community recognized the potential boost an event such as ours might bring to a recession-challenged economy. Many businesses, the local Chamber of Commerce, the Jefferson County Fairgrounds management and board, the county commissioners, the city council and others pulled out the stops to court the event and, once they secured it, to guarantee it would be a success. Right on through to the very end the town loved us and we reciprocated. It made for an outstanding event.

The fairgrounds is an old timey county fair setting right in Madras, lots of indoor space including a spacious arena. Ample parking and grassy areas for the swap meet and trade fair.

Doc Hammill conducted his popular free horse soundness clinic. New this year were the clinics and demonstrations conducted by Laurie Judd of Coos Bay.

From the beginning the concept for this event was that it be a true market festival with the auction as a center piece. We have always wanted to make those three days be a time when folks could come together, whether or not they wished to buy and/or sell, for a broad community networking reunion. And we’ve been fortunate that it has been very successful in just that way. With the spacious and accomodating new venue in Madras we are excited about how the event might now take a giant leap forward in growth.

We have secured the dates for next year, April 14-17, 2010. Those dates fall on Wed. through Sat. which constitutes a big change for us with 4 days of event rather than the previous three. And it leaves Sunday free for folks to travel homewards. We have also shifted the selling schedule. Thursday will be equipment, Friday will be horses and Saturday will be carriages and wagons.

The event will start on Wednesday with the swap meet being open, auction check in underway, and, hopefully, a regional horse and mule plowing championship. The coordinator of the U.S, Plowing Championship in Dayton Ohio, Jim Butcher, has consented to travel out as a judge. We have a few particulars to iron out before we can guarantee the plowing but it’s looking good today.

Amy Jo (A.J.) Ferris, our Events Director, is already working on the expansion of the Small Farm Trade Fair. The Small Farms Conservancy will be working to setup a mini-conference on site with a speaker and workshops.

We have tentative plans to hold sales within the sale, for example; a Thursday evening limited consignment antique literature and related artwork auction. We are also planning to showcase premiere horsedrawn vehicles with pre-assigned selling order and advance cataloging. Discussions are underway on possible changes to the horse auction to make it even more useful to the buyers and sellers.

With all of this and more, we know we’re going to fill up the Jefferson County Fairgrounds early. Should you belong to an organization which wants to hold a meeting or public presentation of some sort, let us know soon. If you think you might want to rent space or be involved in any of the aspects described, please consider getting in touch with us real soon.

Every year volunteers make this event happen. Yes we have a small paid staff and they are critically important but the bulk of the physical labor that goes into this mammoth undertaking comes from volunteers. We take this space to thank them. In fact we don’t even know all of their names but here’s a partial list of volunteers:

Ron and Anita Van Grunsven, Mike MacIntosh and family, Jon Peasley and extended family, Glen Mahan and John Erskine, Henk de Menk, Clarence Wilson, Ed Joseph, Ric Hargreaves, Lou Warren, Harry Ferris, Scout Miller,Robert and Leslie Clark, Brit and Sharon McLin, Doc Hammill, Patrick Baginski and family, Ric and Nadean Murray, Justin and Sarah Miller, Doug and Lorna Barnes, the gaggle of students from Evergreen College in Washington, Betsy Wittick and her friends, Lise Hubbe, Dan Macon, Alan Edwards and many , many unnamed others.

And this year we were joined in our efforts by a surprise troup; Sandy, Andee, J.R., Chuck and Shelly of the fairgrounds group.

And a big thank you to George Zierman of George’s Boots, June Harvey and Kevin Pfeiffer for donating items to both the Auction and the Conservancy and to Laurie Judd for donating the raffle goat for the Conservancy! The proceeds bought sustenance for the workers and supported the Conervancy.

Outstanding event. Let’s do it again! LRM