Farm heritage group to host annual festival at new venue

After 24 years, an annual celebration of Lake County's agricultural roots at the Lakewood Forest Preserve near Wauconda will head north.

What had been known as the Farm Heritage Festival is being rebranded as the Farm Heritage and Harvest Festival to be held Sept. 22-24 at the Lake County Fairgrounds in Grayslake.

Like past events, the 2017 version will feature antique tractors, cars and farm machinery along with animals and demonstrations of blacksmithing and weaving.

But the event will run later and be expanded to include music, beer and ancillary attractions. Both groups want to broaden their reach and regard the new partnership as a means to forward the legacy of agriculture in Lake County.

"It's a nice evolution for them and for us," said John Maguire, director of business development and marketing for the Lake County Fair Association, which operates the fairgrounds at Peterson and Midlothian roads as a year-round venue for a variety of activities.

At 55, Tod Buenger, the new president of the Lake County Farm Heritage Association, is one of its youngest members. He says the forest preserve and heritage group have diverging goals and the switch will provide the best chance of keeping the county's farming roots in the public eye.

"We have more aligned agriculturally with the fairgrounds and the (Lake County) farm bureau than we ever had with the forest preserve," he said.

"I need the fairgrounds to succeed. It's a much better arrangement than with the forest preserve," he said.

In late January, Buenger notified district officials the group was cutting ties and would no longer participate in festivals on forest preserve grounds.

In response a few weeks later, forest board President Ann Maine thanked the association and said the event will be missed.

"It is because of your group that local families know more about our county's rural and agricultural roots," Maine wrote.

Buenger this week said loss of storage was a factor for the association as it had to sell equipment after its rented building at Lakewood was torn down.

The heritage group stores equipment in a district building in Antioch, but that lease expires in November. Long before that, all the equipment owned by the association and its members will be moved and permanently housed at the fairgrounds.

"We relied heavily on their assistance with many aspects of the event, as they supplied the machinery and many of the exhibitors," said Nan Buckardt, director of education for the forest district. "Without their support, the event would simply not be the same. So, the district has decided to no longer host that event."

Maguire noted the fair and heritage group are nonprofits with the mission of educating the public about Lake County's rural and agricultural roots.

"It gives them a little more exposure," he said of the venue change.

Buenger said there was no bitterness.

"We like to make kids smile and we like to drive around on our tractors," he said.