State Fair officials announced the "fair by the numbers" today and the biggest stat of all is 1,037,982. That’s the record-breaking attendance number as the fair.
The State Fair has drawn an attendance of more than one million for the sixth year in a row now. This year’s total was up from 1,028,049 last year.
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This year’s fair was the 167th, and the Giant Slide, State Fair Park Mounted Police and the Kids From Wisconsin all celebrated their 50th anniversaries.
Guests had the opportunity to view 3,000 exhibitors and appreciate 22,000 flowers and plants decorating the park.
They – or should I say we? – ate 11,500 orders of Deep-Fried Spinach Lasagna Bites at Albanese’s Roadhouse, and 11,000 noshed on French Onion Soup On-A-Stick at Slim’s PBR Park.
In the Wisconsin Products Pavilion, we tossed back 55,000 grilled cheeses at the Real Wisconsin Cheese Grill in the Wisconsin Products Pavilion, 16,000 Butterfly Pork Sandwiches at the Pork Shoppe and 40,000 spuds at the Wisconsin Baked Potatoes stand.
Lord only knows how much ice cream and flavored milk our bodies processed.
But we saved room for dessert to the tune of nearly 400,000 Original Cream Puffs.
The WonderFair Wheel took more than 90,000 people for a ride and almost 120,000 slid down the Giant Slide.
That oughta hold us until the 168th annual Wisconsin State Fair opens 351 days from now.
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
