Great Frederick Fair 4-H

The Great Frederick Fair 2009 is always a wonder of the agricultural bounty of Frederick County, MD, and much more. This post will focus on agrictultural bounty. The next post will focus on networking and the third on the business end of fair, or pure capitalist wonder.

I find such county and state fairs a harvest reminder of the farming basis of this great American experiment and my own family's farm in Perkasie, PA and my Pennsylvania Dutch ancestors as well. My wife's family ownes and operates the Ruggles Orchard in Levels, WV.

So few Americans make their living at farming these days that we are in danger of losing our identity as an agricultural nation, yet agriculture is what created and continues to create the basis of our civilization. Agricultural fairs are a great way to remember how important the abundance of God's good earth is to our past, present and future.

So much of what goes on at any ag fair is created by 4-H, which includes science, engineering and technology. See their hard work reflected in their products below.

Bluebirds and Hummingbirds

This week I had the gift of seeing a brood of bluebirds reach full growth and fly away. I also had to rescue a hummingbird that was stuck in the garage. (After he was exhaused, I put a pole near him. He jumped on it, I lowered it and he flew to freedom).Read about how the North American Bluebird Society (and Dr. Lawrence Zeleny) helped save this wonder of nature here.

Blue Bird of the Manger


Journalists, media moguls
And Hollywood thespians
Appear daily to tell us
The world is ending,
The earth is warming.
And death, destruction,
Disease, starvation

And all form of pestilence
Are one more pollutant,
One more war,
One more way,
Other than their way,
Just about to strike.

And yet, the blue birds sing.
They arrive Christmas Day
Just when it seems
They would never appear
In the nest box some poet
Put in the middle of a garden.

They sing and sing
From God’s lips
To our hearts
To tell us the answers
Are with our Creator

If we are not so busy
Worrying and pontificating
To hear the bluebirds sing
From their holy nest box
Around the crypt, city and country
About The Gift in the manger.

Bridges of Washington County

On a hot day in August, I took Eamon (my youngest) and Sidda (our dog) on an adventure driving around to view the stone bridges of Washington County, Maryland. It was a blast.These stone bridges of Washington County, Maryland are a wonder of early 18th century American genius. The politicians in those years wanted the farmers and merchants to be satisfied with wooden bridges...which often collapsed from a heavy load or from flooding. So...those early American's voted the crooked politicians out of office and voted in honest ones who set about to build these strong, solid stone arch bridges. Hmmm...maybe we can learn from our early American ancestors and imitate their success in the 1810 election.