Ledger Looking Back 25 Years: August 22, 1996

AUGUST 22, 1996

The 13th annual Jefferson County Fair and Rodeo begins Thursday, Aug. 22, with four days of live music, rodeos, parades, exhibits and activities for the whole family. All of the fun will be at the Jefferson County Recreation Park and Fairgrounds one-half mile south of Boulder. Known as “A Fair of the Hear,” the fair is an old-fashioned country fair held in barns and sheds from a bygone era. Highlights of the fair include three days of rodeo and Saturday’s parade sponsored by the Jefferson County Rodeo Association.

Seventy firefighters were called in Friday to battle a blaze apparently caused by lightning in the Boulder/Basin area. Reported about 3 p.m., the fire had burned five acres in the Beaverhead/Deerlodge National Forest near Berrys Meadows and Porcupine Gulch by 5 p.m. Friday. After making good progress overnight Friday, the firefighters were able to cool the fire and get it under control Saturday. Forest Service officials remind forest users that fire danger remains high to very high and caution campers to build only small campfires, only when actually needed, and never to leave campfires unattended.

The Internet is coming to the John Gregory Library in Whitehall and will be available to the public for free soon, librarian Donna Worth said. “We have just had a new phone line installed that will handle our 586K Internet connection and the rest of the equipment will be installed early in September,” Worth said. “This will be a high speed unlimited access connection to the Internet that the public will be free to use at the library,” she said. The equipment and installation was provided by the Broad Valleys Library Federation, a library group to which the John Gregory Library belongs.