×
×
homepage logo

Horsing around for half a century

Marlin Krupp is celebrating 50 years on the Fair Board

By Fiona Green - Staff Writer | Aug 20, 2023

Marlin Krupp was recognized for his 50 years of service on the Fair Board at the 2023 Farm and Fair Awards on Thursday, July 27.

For Marlin Krupp, ‘horsing around’ is serious business. At least, it is when it comes to the Faribault County Fair.

Krupp, who recently celebrated his 50th anniversary on the Fair Board, channels his passion for horses into his work around the Fairgrounds.

Predictably, Krupp’s five decade tenure on the board began at the Indoor Horse Arena, where he carved out a niche for himself at an early age. Krupp showed a horse the year before he left for the Army, and was an exhibitor once again after he returned in 1967.

“That led me to become the horse barn superintendent,” Krupp explains.

Former Fair Board member Marvin Feist came across superintendent Krupp at the arena in 1972. Fair Week had come to a close, and Krupp had taken on the mammoth task of mucking out the 48 stalls left dirty by their occupants.

“He asked, ‘Do you want to be on the Fair Board?’ and I said, “I might as well,'” Krupp recalls, with a chuckle. He joined the board the following November, and since then he has seen 50 Fair Weeks come and go.

Krupp got his first horse long before he joined the Fair Board, when he was 12 years old.

“My mother was expecting my youngest sister. I, of course, wanted a brother. So, my dad brought me my first horse,” Krupp says. “I rode in (Elmore’s) Horse and Buggy Days in 1955, and that was the whole start of it.”

Krupp continued riding in area horse shows, including the South Central Saddle Club Horse Show and horse shows in Trimont and Madelia.

“I rode all the way up until 2012,” Krupp says. “That December, I got T-boned in an intersection.”

Krupp broke his neck, was concussed, and underwent rotator cuff surgery.

Some months later, Krupp informed his doctor that he had ridden his horse in the Bricelyn Independence Days Parade for the past 40 years, and he did not intend to miss that year’s parade on July 4.

However, Krupp’s doctor was unmoved.

“He said, ‘If you ride your horse on the fourth, I will put you in the hospital on the third and the fifth. Your neck can’t stand it,'” Krupp recalls.

Krupp did ride his horse in the parade the following summer, but he had a tough time of it.

“He was a good horse, and I couldn’t keep up with him,” he explains.

Krupp made the difficult decision to sell his horse, Twister, to a family in Fairmont, whose daughter would ride him.

“I told her she had to talk to him. If she told him to turn left or right, walk or run, he would do as told,” Krupp says. “She’s been rodeoing him, and doing quite well.”

Krupp still visits Twister from time to time, and he always receives a warm reception from the horse.

“I carried him to the barn when he was born in 2000, and he never heard another voice until he was 15 years old,” Krupp says. “When I go to see (the daughter) ride, I’ll always go over to the horse and talk to him, rub his ears and face.”

Krupp enjoys watching Twister perform under the reins of his young rider. However, Krupp still holds the reins – so to speak – when it comes to the east end of the Fairgrounds.

“That has always been my project,” Krupp says.

He and former Fair Board member Gary Johnson were instrumental in the establishment of the Outdoor Horse Arena. They determined a need for the project when the Fair’s Fjord horse shows – established by Johnson – grew in size and popularity.

“As it progressed over the years, we kept getting more horses,” Krupp says. “That was the only Fjord show in North America.”

Aware that the arena was too small to accommodate an upcoming show, Krupp and Johnson stepped off the current site of the Outdoor Horse Arena and set to work.

The Frost Border Riders and Gopher Saddle Club of Winnebago made contributions to the project, and a local welder made the announcer stand and its surrounding iron fence, both of which still stand today.

The Fjord horse shows continued for 33 years. Krupp remembers one anniversary show which drew Fjords from Colorado, Nebraska, Montana, Michigan, North and South Dakota, and Iowa. The show was so large, 40 additional stalls were erected in the center of the Indoor Horse Arena.

Though the Fjord horse shows are no more, Krupp has brought a new show to the Fair to take their place. The Mule Show is now in its third year, and Krupp thinks it is going well.

“I couldn’t stand not seeing something horse-wise in the arena,” Krupp says. “It’s something different.”

As to other changes at the Fair, Krupp says the carnival on the Midway has evolved over the years. Ever since the Fair’s regular carnival supplier went out of business, the board has struggled to find a reliable carnival for hire.

“The worst part of the carnival business is there are 87 counties in Minnesota, and only eight to 10 carnivals,” Krupp explains. He adds one year, the Fair Board hired a carnival and it never showed up.

Krupp also notes the changing topography of the Fairgrounds, including the erection of the Veterans Memorial Building and Oldfather Hall, and the construction of the Paschke Building after the round barn burned down in 1985.

Through the ups and downs, Krupp says he has enjoyed the past half-century of Fair shenanigans.

“It’s been a fun run for me. I’ve been on the Fair Board since 1973, and I started auctioning in 1968, so that’s been my life,” Krupp says.

He adds it is the people – both those on the Fair Board, and those he spots around the grounds during Fair Week – which make the experience worthwhile.

Of his fellow Fair Board members, Krupp says, “They all have been my friends over the past 50 years, and they’re still my friends today.”

He adds, “I can’t say I haven’t enjoyed any of the fairs,” although he admits Fair Week brings long, 12 to 14 hour days. Krupp appreciates his wife, Donna, and daughter Kim’s willingness to give him up for all of those hours.

“When I first got on (the Fair Board), my family knew I was gone the whole week of the Fair,” Krupp says. “After I married, I was at the Fair the whole week like always. I had the cooperation of my family.”

Krupp himself got some appreciation at this year’s Farm and Fair Awards. He was presented with a plaque honoring his 50 years on the Fair Board, and learned that the Outdoor Horse Arena will be renamed after him.

“I thank the Fair Board for that honor,” he says. He adds, with a smile, “I didn’t want to die to get the arena named after me.”