Puckett said if she told herself eight years ago that she would be wearing a crown every day of the fair, she wouldn’t believe it.
“It’s something that my younger self never thought possible,” Puckett said. “But I like to tell people that 4-H gives you the opportunity to do anything you want. I want to show this year that anyone can do anything because if my five-year-old self saw me wearing these bell-bottom jeans and HeyDudes she would not believe what was happening.”
Kidd said he only recently thought about applying to be fair king. During the application and interview process, he had help from his sisters who were fair queens in two of the last four years.
“I only really thought I’d be doing it about four or five months ago,” Kidd said. “I was thinking about it a lot and I realized; you know what, I want to follow in my sister’s footsteps. They’ve been such good examples to me and have sent me on my path.”
The pair were chosen through an application and interview process with judges who considered their involvement in clubs and organizations and skills such as public speaking.
Kidd and Puckett attended every showing at the fairgrounds so far while Puckett has shown her market goats and Kidd showed his lamb along with a woodworking project. While Puckett and Kidd said the week has been a lot of work, they’ve both enjoyed spending time with younger fairgoers doing everything from talking about the fair to dancing together.
Kidd and Puckett will represent Butler County until next year’s royalty is selected. Kidd said the honor of being intertwined with what he called “the best county fair” is nothing short of what he hoped.
“I’m excited and I’m honored and humbled to be able to serve the community and be able to be the one that people will look at and say ‘that kids from Butler County, Butler County must be good,’” he said
When she was growing up, Puckett was involved with junior fair programs that she said were influential and helpful to her now. She now wants to give back to those programs in the next year as part of her duties.
“It’s an incredible honor to be able to be here and hopefully be the inspiration for the upcoming generation,” Puckett said.
Kidd and Puckett will continue the year by going to county fairs across the state to learn about different programs and spread information about Butler County.
More online
The Butler County Fair ends Saturday, July 27. See lots of photos and read more stories about it at journal-news.com.
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