ALTAMONT — On Tuesday morning, the Altamont Fair was underway.

In mid-morning, three sisters, with the fairgrounds temporarily to themselves, walked down a road as fair-goers trickled in through the entrances. The youngest of the sisters, dressed in pink, kept pace with her mother and grandmother and took charge by pushing her stroller.
Across the fairgrounds, a bearded man with tattoos on his forearms and a "Bike Week" hat stood with his hands in his pockets, pivoting to different vantage points for some direction. It was almost 11 in the morning. It wasn’t yet time for lunch, and it was a little late for breakfast.

Workers busied themselves by driving golf carts, talking through their radios.
"What is your favorite movie" And why is it your favorite movie"" asked the emcee of the Altamont Fair pageant, which kicked off at the Reid Northrup Stage at 11 a.m.

In the poultry barn, roosters crowed, their caws filling the long building — a call to fair-goers to rise and shine.

"Easy, Beulah"

On her day off, Beulah, a 40-year-old Asian elephant got a bath.

Using a high-pressure washer, Jerry Eeziel circled around the large animal that eats between 300 and 400 pounds each day. While Eeziel sprayed her down and three others used scrub brushes on the animal’s thick skin, fair-goers congregated around the enormous animal and took snapshots with their cell phones and cameras.

Beulah belongs to the Connecticut-based Commerford and Sons, a traveling petting zoo, which offers pony, camel and elephant rides. The traveling attraction stays around the East Coast, and is also appearing in a show in Buffalo this week, said Eeziel.

While hosing down Beulah, Eeziel spoke to the elephant often, telling her to be steady. He also convinced her to lie down. On command, she knelt then rolled over on her side, like a giant, docile trained dog.
"We give her a bath pretty much every day," said Michael Irish, who worked with Eeziel, Christina Straway, and Natalia Borowy, washing Beulah. To cool her off, Eeziel sprayed water in her large mouth.
"She’s very popular everywhere we go," said Eeziel. "She’s also very spoiled — a very spoiled elephant."

Beulah eats about five bales of hay each day, and anything else she can get — apples, oranges, bananas, carrots, and cookies. Anything but meat.
"They’re not too different than a horse when they get sick," said Eeziel, who likened Beulah to a household pet. "When she’s not feeling good, we know."

Down the Hill

This year marked the fifth year of horse competitions for the Baldaufs, and a first for Tayla Baldauf. Baldauf competed for the first time in horse shows at the Altamont Fair.

By Tuesday afternoon, Tayla Baldauf had won a number of awards. She first won fourth, fifth, and sixth place awards, and then won three firsts and one third. Her awards were on display at her small stable.
"Now, I just need a second," Tayla Baldauf said. Baldauf competed in the Starter Rider Walk/Jog class, which is open to anyone from 11 to 29 years old in their first two years of showing.

Tayla’s brother, Devon, has competed before, and her mother, Lynne, has been riding horses for years. Devon Baldauf sat atop his horse on Tuesday, practicing for his main competitions on Wednesday.

The Baldaufs’ horse has two names: Mak is its barn name, and Maakai is its show name, the family said.
They didn’t have to travel far away to attend the fair — "literally down the Hill," Tayla Baldauf said. The Baldaufs live on about 30 acres in East Berne.
"It’s competitive," said Tayla Baldauf of the tri-county fair. She described competition as being "like Simon Says," a game in which children follow Simon’s directions. Her friends, she said, were also competing, and she wanted to show them that she can ride just as well.
"It’s hard," Tayla Baldauf said. "That’s why I have my mom whose been riding since she was this big," she said, holding her hand waist-high.

Tradition

The Church Restaurant, a long-time fair staple, was up and running again Tuesday morning. Two young girls took orders at the entrance, and another took charge of the latest addition to the restaurant — the water window, where snacks and beverages are sold.

Operated by volunteers, the restaurant is a fund-raiser for two churches — Saint Lucy’s Church in Altamont and Saint Bernadette Church in Berne.

The restaurant’s menu includes cheeseburgers, hamburgers, fries, salads, and hot dogs. The restaurant also offers breakfast, deserts, and refillable sodas.

Steve Marciano, 19, started the week off as the restaurant’s shift manager Tuesday morning. Marciano began working at the restaurant when he was just 3 years old.
"I’ve been doing it forever," he said. The restaurant, Marciano said, is a way for him to gain work experience and to hang out with his friends. He is attending Siena College in Loudonville, majoring in accounting. This summer, he spent two months in New York City as an intern with an investment banking corporation.

History
"I’m a suburbanite, but I love the history of how people lived," said Elizabeth Tomlinson. A Schenectady resident, Tomlinson volunteers each year to staff the Farm House Museum, which is filled with farming artifacts from the late 1800s and early 1900s.
"There were vast differences in their way of life," she said.

Tomlinson has been returning to the fair each August for about 30 years. Tuesday, she walked around the museum, pointing out items hanging on the walls and recalled fond memories of times at the fair.

Old washing machines, butter molds, a bed, a rug-beater, and a prototype vacuum are just a few of the items that fill the building. Many of the items have been damaged and donated. Determining the date the artifacts were manufactured is difficult, she said, and many tags on items have blown away or been lost. Some items at the museum are on loan from historical societies or individuals.

Wearing a long blue skirt, sandals, and a white blouse, Tomlinson looked the part of someone from a bygone era. She spoke to young boys and mothers about old washing techniques and explained the worn antiques.

After making her way to a corner of the museum, she showed an antique bed, which used criss-crossing ropes as supports instead of a box spring and mattress.

Tomlinson also told of customs different from our own. To invoke the curiosity of others and let them know they had exotic stories to share, people would place pineapples in their windows or a boot at the end of their driveway. Thus, pineapples have become a symbol of hospitality.

As an economy measure, families often made and bottled their own juice, root beer, beer, and wine. Sometimes the juices would ferment and the bottles would explode, she said, sending the father to the cellar to clean up the mess.

In the past, the museum had different themes each year.

Tomlinson laughs when recalling a mock wedding one year in which the groom didn’t make it to the altar, and a married man who fit the outfit was plucked from the audience to play the part. During the fake wedding, the priest came to the moment when he asked whether anyone objected to the union.
"That’s my husband!" yelled the groom’s wife.
Tomlinson also displayed "one of the most terrifying objects at the fair" — an old vacuum cleaner called the American Wonder.
She also showed an old "washing machine" — an object much like a modern plunger that was used to wash clothes in a bucket. "You did not buy this unit. You bought the patent to use it," she said. The plain-looking plunger, with baffles and holes on its cone-like metal end, sold for no less than $3.50, a large sum at the time. Tomlinson said that, adjusting for inflation, it cost more than what someone would pay today for an electric washing machine.
"You get way more for your money these days," she said.
As she explained the contraption to a small group, a woman passing by said, "I’m glad I was born now and not then."