The 11th annual Meredith Dairy Fest will begin Saturday with a flag-raising ceremony and with a new leader.
After chairing the free event for 10 years, John and Mary Hamilton stepped down so they could spend much of the winter in Florida.
"John began working on getting the cow signs ready in the fall and worked on them all winter," Mary Hamilton said Wednesday of the lawn advertisements for the Fest. "This year, he has even had time to work in the yard, and I think he is really enjoying it."
Ed Fisher, the new chairman, said the event nearly didn't happen.
"They were going to take a vote on not doing it this year, and I stood up and said I will do it myself if I have to, so they made me chairman," Fisher said Wednesday.
The festival runs Saturday and Sunday, and he said it won't change much under his management.
"It kind of runs itself," Fisher said. "Everyone expects it and plans on it every year."
The festival is a fundraiser for the Meridale Fire Department and is held "at the top of the hill" off of state Route 28, according to the festival website.
This year, 107 of the traditional white Meredith Dairy Fest cow signs were placed in the area, but there are also seven hand-painted cows designed by students from Delhi, Andes and South Kortright that will be auctioned off Sunday.
There will also be a garden tractor pull this year, Fisher said, organized by a local club.
Wylla Rabeler is the secretary of the event and organizes the entertainment.
"The weather is what we are waiting for this year," Rabeler said.
The entertainment tent Saturday show begins at 11 a.m. with the Delhi Middle School Band and the Delhi Town Band followed by the Schoharie Valley Cloggers and Country Express from 2 to 5 p.m. On Sunday, Yancy Brown performs at 11 a.m. followed by the Blue Ribbon Cloggers and the band Just Throw Money.
The two-day event will feature live entertainment, children's games and rides, cow-plop bingo, animal exhibits, more than 100 vendors, a wine-and-cheese tasting, the cow-art silent auction and foods prepared by the Delhi Fire Department and private vendors.
The Merry Homemakers, a Meredith women's club, will be making special cow-chip sundaes, as well as ice cream floats known as brown, purple and orange cows.
Other attractions include the Delaware County Fireman's Association Family Fire Safety Program, featuring its smoke trailer.
"We will have the train rides for the kids," Rabeler said.
For more information, visit www.dairyfest.com.
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