Old-time country fair coming to Kline Creek Farm
Get the picnic basket ready, hitch up the horses and straighten your bonnet: it’s time for an old-fashioned country fair.
Visitors can step back in time for the free event from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 1-2, at the DuPage Forest Preserve District’s Kline Creek Farm, 1N600 County Farm Road, West Chicago.
The fair will feature a midway similar to those that once lured farm families from across the region. Performers will include the Amazing Budabi Brothers who, at 10 a.m. and 1 p.m., will dazzle crowds with their acrobatic juggling and Professor Marvel’s Amazing Flea Circus at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. both days.
Dr. Jack MacRae will exhibit artifacts and oddities at 12:30 and 3:30 p.m. in the Tent of Wonder, and world-champion gun spinner Garret Popek will flash the legendary skills of the Wild West at noon and 3 p.m.
Visitors also can compete in contests to take home ribbons, play games, admire homemade pies and preserves, get up close to some award-winning livestock, and hop on a hayrack ride throughout the day.
In the 1890s, a local fair was an important social and economic event. Family members squeezed in work on fair projects among their many regular chores. Imagine hand-stitching a quilt, putting up perfect pickles or raising a calf, all to impress the judges and your neighboring farm families.
Kline Creek Farm is an 1890s living-history farm owned and operated by the forest preserve district. It is open from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. Thursdays through Mondays.
For information on programs and events, call the farm at (630) 876-5900. To learn more about the forest preserve district, call (630) 933-7200 or visit dupageforest.org.
If you go
What: 1800s-style Country Fair
When: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday and Sunday, Sept. 1-2
Where: Kline Creek Farm, 1N600 County Farm Road, West Chicago
Cost: Free
Info: (630) 933-7200 or dupageforest.org