Historic Ritzville Days cooks up success

Downtown Ritzville’s streets were filled with visitors over the Memorial Day weekend and the sounds of children’s laughter and gunfire could be heard throughout the city. According to the chairman of the Historic Ritzville Days Western Art Show event, Jennifer Saunders, an estimated 2,000 people attended the weekend’s festivities.

“I’m very pleased with it, it’s the best show yet,” said Saunders. “The entertainment was great, the grassroots bands were well-received.”

The entire event began with the Artists’ Reception on Friday evening when around 115 people attended to enjoy a “cowboy” dinner and view artwork from artists attending the show. Attendees had the opportunity to vote for their favorite piece of art on display at the event and the People’s Choice award was later presented to Sherry Orchard.

Orchard is a self-taught artist from Walla Walla who has experimented with many mediums, the most popular being her feather art. Orchard creates masterpieces by painted on feathers, created a texture and beauty not found in most mediums.

This year, artists were asked to bring a five-by-five original piece of artwork to be put into a single compilation piece of art. The one of a kind masterpiece was auctioned off after the dinner and sold for $775 to Lavonne Saunders.

The majority of visitors attended Saturday’s events and the recent additions proved to be popular. The appetizing smells from the Dutch Oven Cook-off brought many of the visitors to the center of town with questions and interest in the competition.

There were four teams who participated in the competition: Joe and Diane Harris, the Lodge Pole Ranch team from Touchet; Art Russell and Nancy Johnson, the Cast-Iron Clunkers from Moses Lake; Clif and Amos Peterson, the Cinco Niños team from Port Orchard, and the local team of Luke and Trish McRae.

While the Dutch Oven participants were cooking up the delicious smelling food, children found amusement with the stick-pony races, pony rides and the youth art experience booth. The youth art experience proved to be the busiest booth at the event as children could be seen creating their artwork from opening until closing each day.

Iron Legacy Ranch, LLC provided the pony rides and on Saturday alone, the coordinators provided 115 pony rides to willing participants. Children also had the opportunity to learn to rope calves with lessons provided by Ryan Tracy, co-owner of Iron Legacy Ranch, or any other cowboy passing by.

With a single shot from a gun, visitors of all ages came running to the corral to watch the gunfight ensue between outlaws and sheriffs. The Ritzville Community Theatre group provided quality entertainment with their gunfights and reenactment of the Gunfight at OK Corral.

“The theatre group is getting better and better, and the OK Corral this year was great. They put a lot of time and effort into it, and it showed,” said Saunders.

The windy weather during the two-day show proved to be an annoyance, but visitors took the opportunity to travel inside or to booths of vendors and artists. With a constant stream of visitors, artists used the chance to talk to guests about their medium and artwork.

Many artists had a lot of success and Jim Bauer, creator of the metal boots that served as advertisement for the show, nearly sold out during the event. Bauer is not the only vendor who found his supply limited at the end of the event. Tucannon Meats, LLC sold out of stock on Saturday afternoon while the Wooden Nickel found it’s shelves bare and the business closed for Sunday traffic.

At 1 p.m. on Saturday, the Dutch Oven competitors began serving desserts to the judges and the quality of food presented surprised the general public who were not familiar with Dutch Oven cooking.

A half an hour later, breads were presented to the judges. The two braided breads submitted by the Lodge Pole Ranch team and the Cast-Iron Clunkers immediately grabbed the passerby’s attention.

By the time the main courses were served, a large crowd had surrounded the food and the desire to become a judge was voiced by all in attendance. The competitors had a chance make a plate of food before the public was allowed to consume what remained.

Later in the afternoon, awards were presented to the teams with fourth place going to the McRae’s, third place to Lodge Pole Ranch and second place to the Cast-Iron Clunkers. The Peterson’s father/son team took home the first place ribbon, a ribbon that exceeded young Amos Peterson in height.

“Dutch Oven Cook-off is one of the best additions we’ve made, we already started making plans for next year,” said Saunders. “It drew a crowd, and people were asking questions, and watching how they cook. They can cook everything in a Dutch oven that you can in a regular oven, and flavor is much better.”

During the Sunday festivities, a large crowd gathered early for Cowboy Church and many people wandered downtown before the show technically began. The crowds remained small until the afternoon when many people walked down the hill from the Classic Car Show at the Ritzville City Park.

Saunders believes that the foot traffic between the car show and the art show increased because of advertisement at each event. It is the first year that it has been confirmed people came down from the car show and vice versa, Saunders explained.

Johnson, from the Cast-Iron Clunkers team, returned to Main Avenue to provide visitors with delicious Dutch Oven food free of charge. Johnson started the morning with a cherry chocolate cobbler, followed by a “mountain man” breakfast and a peach, pineapple cobbler.

Even though the event just concluded, Saunders is already making plans for next year and taking into consideration all of the feedback she received over the course of the weekend. A few changes she hopes to implement next year are a slight change in hours and expanding the Dutch Oven competition.

The one thing that Saunders hopes to never have to change is allowing artists to have booths free of charge. Since artists are not charged to display their artwork at the event, the committee asks the artists to donate one piece of art to be auctioned off at a later date as a fundraiser for the event.

Overall, Saunders is pleased with the success of the event and the positive feedback she has received. The majority of her pride comes with the constant amount of gratitude from the artists and how they want to return to the show because of the hospitality of the committee and kindness from the community.