Weather no problem for Farm, Ranch Expo

Thursday, November 19, 2015
Darren Dale of Bird City, Kansas, left, manager of the annual "McCook Farm & Ranch Expo" on the Red Willow County fairgrounds in McCook, Nebraska, explains the complex electrical setup four feet under the floor of the Kiplinger Arena to Jacob Kranz of "Flagpole Solutions" of Gaylord, Minnesota. "I follow all of Darren's shows," Kranz said. "They're nice people to work for." Darren also manages shows in Great Bend, Kansas, and Wichita Falls, Texas. Two to three inches of rain, 40-mile-an-hour winds and six to eight inches of snow Tuesday and early Wednesday morning in and around McCook didn't keep away Dale's vendors, nor did more rain Wednesday discourage visitors. The expo runs today through 4 p.m. (Connie Jo Discoe/McCook Gazette)

McCOOK, Neb. -- Darren Dale just picks a date and goes with it.

Dale, the manager of the annual "McCook Farm and Ranch Expo" on the fairgrounds, wasn't fazed by weather that most considered, in one word, "bad."

After scraping off six to eight inches of snow Wednesday morning and dodging the rain drops that fell Wednesday afternoon, Darren was philosophical about it all. "I just pick a date and go for it," he said, with a grin.

Connie Jo Discoe/McCook Gazette

He continued, "We're dealing with ag producers here. They feed their cattle in the snow. They feed in the rain. They feed when it's 90 degrees outside."

So a little rain and a little snow fell ... so the wind blew. The vendors still arrived ... the crowds still came.

Darren was touched deeply by the help he got with the fairgrounds buried under a heavy, wet snow Wednesday morning, the first day of the expo. "Case, John Deere, Don Klein, Schaffert's ... they showed up with forklifts, tractors, snowplows. They just showed up ... I didn't have to ask."

"Waiting for breakfast, people, Dale and Joan (Stewart) ... grabbed snow scoops and scooped snow," Darren said. "I didn't ask. They just did it."

"That's what's best about Southwest Nebraska and Northwest Kansas," Darren said. "It's the greatest place to live. It's all agriculture. People take care of each other."

Darren said several vendors with the big implements came in on Sunday and Monday, needing to be in place on the ends of the arena in the Kiplinger building before electrical work could be done and booth divider pipes and drapes could be erected. Darren praised McCook electrician Scott Boehm for his work to get power across the arena through the PVC pipe permanently buried four feet in the ground in the Kiplinger, Trudy and Alice buildings, and to provide breaker service to each booth.

Darren couldn't say enough about the work that Charlie Collins does to prepare the floor in the Kiplinger. "It's water-packed, rolled and scraped, and it's dust-free," Darren said. "It has to be flat and level so that the pipes and drapes stay upright."

"There's no other dirt floor like this in the United States," Darren said. "People from all over the country call Charlie when they need to know about dirt floors. He's amazing."

The main focus of Darren's praise, however, is the man responsible for the construction of the big arenas, stall buildings and livestock handling facilities on the fairgrounds -- McCook-area farmer-rancher and fairgrounds benefactor Tom Kiplinger. "The guy who never quits giving," Darren called him.

"The new Alice Building is a game-changer," Darren said. "Seventeen thousand square feet of new exhibit space ... it's amazing. My vendor number is up because of the new building."

Darren's eighth annual farm and ranch expo showcased 350 vendors inside and outside of five buildings, live cattle displays, a working ranch horse sale, Scott Daily horse training demonstrations, a beer garden and more than $5,000 in door prizes.

Darren said he is "very humbled" by the response of vendors and visitors to his farm and ranch expo. People appreciate the nearness of a show this size and caliber. "Yep, it's right here," Darren said. "It's not in Louisville, Kentucky. (the site of the recent international livestock expo). It's right here in our hometown."

Darren, and his wife Tana, son Taos (the "chairman of the board") and daughter Taya ("lead promoter and princess") coordinate similar farm and ranch expos in Great Bend, Kansas, and Wichita Falls, Texas.

Darren's Facebook site is www.StarExpos.net; call (866) 685-0989

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