Fair workers prepare for ‘The Show’

The Spider’s legs were already stretched out when Tom Shepherd approached the ride.

Employees of Smokey Mountain Amusements have spent this week piecing together half the rides for the Iredell County Fair, which begins Monday.

“Who wants pork chops for dinner?” Shepherd asked.

“I do,” responded Gordon Cox from under one of the carts.

Cox is a veteran at what he and his co-workers call “The Show.”

“This is a good family show,” he said in between part fittings. “They take care of their help, and a lot of shows don’t.”

Cox and his co-workers spend months on the road in trailers and bunkhouses, traveling from town to town.

Before the flashing lights and the squeals of delight, the Iredell County Fairgrounds in Troutman is a world of their own.

Their days are filled with putting rides together, making repairs and cleaning up.

Going home is the vacation, said Brandy Clouse of Alexandria, Tenn.

“It doesn’t take but a few weeks, and you’re ready to come back,” she said. “You don’t really notice what town you’re in. We are in our own little world.”

Clouse, who joined Smokey Mountain four years ago in Hendersonville, is scrubbing down vendor David Lanier’s funnel cake stand in the middle of the midway.

She has to get it “David Lanier clean,” she said.

“You don’t look at it as your job,” she said. “It’s your way of life. We’re like family out here.”

Hundreds of snuffed out cigarette butts discarded while the rides are assembled dot the Iredell County fairgrounds, along with water bottles, Mountain Dew cans and other items waiting to be thrown away.

Cox, a Massachusetts-native, has worked for one amusement ride company or another his entire life. The last time he went back to his home state was in 1979, he said, when he buried his father.

His father was a “ride jock” and his mother worked the games, he said.

“I enjoy it,” he said. “Just to see a child smile when you’re running a ride - it makes it all worthwhile.”

On Wednesday afternoon, Cox was working with new recruits John Brewer and Jason Martin.

Brewer and Martin, both of Statesville, were hired on Monday.

The two plan to join the others on the road after the fair ends.

Smokey Mountain Amusements General Manager Brian Bitner said he has about a 90 percent turnover rate in his crew. He said the people employed now have been around for a long time.

“The ones that stay, they’re long-term,” he said.

Bitner, who’s been with the company for 15 years, said he’s worked with carnival rides his entire life.

Shepherd said he and his wife, Y Dang, started following “The Show” about two years ago.

The couple operates a food stand and acts as the company’s catering service for its employees.

“It is more of a way of life than a job,” he said. “We are at home on the road.”

The couple has their own trailer, complete with a Dish Network satellite behind their service trailer.

“I’m a CNN junkie,” Shepherd said.

The former printing consultant said they got started when the printing company he was working for in Florida shut down. They were selling items at the flea market for a while when they noticed no one was selling any food.

A few “you shoulds” later, he said, they ended up with their small trailer.

“We use the best material we can,” he said.

The workers only spent part of the day working on the Iredell County Fair before loading up and traveling to Burlington to open another fair.

Bitner said there is still a lot of work to be done before the fair opens on Monday.

“One thing about the rides - it’s good, honest, hard work,” Cox said.

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