White Pine County Nevada Fair Festival

A County Fair With a Racetrack at Its Heart

Most county fairs treat a horse event as one attraction among many. In White Pine County the relationship runs the other way. The event published for Ely each late August is the White Pine County Fair and Horse Races, a single combined weekend in which the judged exhibits and the pari-mutuel race meet share the same grounds, the same three days and the same name. Neither half is a side show for the other: the races are not entertainment laid on beside the fair, and the fair is not a craft market parked outside a racetrack. They were joined from the beginning.

Ely is the county seat, and it hosts its own fair at the White Pine County Fairgrounds on Fairview Lane, beside the Marich Softball Complex. For 2026 the published edition runs Friday, August 21 through Sunday, August 23, with the first race called to post at three in the afternoon on Friday and at one in the afternoon on Saturday and Sunday. Friday costs nothing to enter, while Saturday and Sunday carry a five-dollar gate — simple pricing that, with a nineteen-thirties track and a full fair programme wrapped around live betting, makes this one of Nevada’s more distinctive fair weekends.

About the White Pine County Fair and Horse Races

The combined name is the first fact worth holding onto. The state event record and Ely’s own visitor pages both publish the weekend under that full title, and the programme they describe is genuinely double. One side is a working county fair: 4-H exhibits, livestock shown and sold at auction, craft and vendor stalls, food and a bar, live music across the three days. The other is a proper race meet, with thoroughbreds and quarter horses running under pari-mutuel rules, meaning stakes are pooled among the bettors and payouts follow the final odds. That betting structure is the weekend’s signature — a rarity at a small Nevada county fair — and it shapes the days, as crowds drift between the exhibits and the rail as each race approaches.

The grounds are a county responsibility, governed today by White Pine County Agricultural District 13, whose advisory body is styled the White Pine County Fair and Rodeo Grounds Advisory Board in its agendas, with its business through 2026 conducted at the fairgrounds. Ely’s event pages list separate organiser contacts for the fair side and the race side: two traditions, separately tended, presented as one.

Quick Facts

Detail	What the record shows
Published event name	White Pine County Fair and Horse Races
Fair town	Ely, Nevada
County seat	Ely
Grounds	White Pine County Fairgrounds, Fairview Lane, beside the Marich Softball Complex
Grounds governance	White Pine County Agricultural District 13, advised by the White Pine County Fair and Rodeo Grounds Advisory Board
2026 edition	Friday, August 21 to Sunday, August 23, in late August
Post times	Three in the afternoon Friday; one in the afternoon Saturday and Sunday
Admission	Friday free; Saturday and Sunday five dollars, as published for 2026
Racing	Live pari-mutuel thoroughbred and quarter-horse racing
Parking and camping	No event-side parking price or fair camping terms published in the record

One caution belongs with the address: county meeting papers use a Great Basin Highway address for the same site, and a secondary listing gives a North McGill Highway form. Those are different published descriptions of one venue, not three places, and navigating to Fairview Lane follows the event record’s own directions.

For a useful comparison, see the Washoe County Nevada Reno River Festival for another county festival.

A Depression-Era Start, Told in Two Layers

The documented history begins with the horses. Ely’s own account records that the races were originally organised in 1934 by local ranchers and business people, naming Bill Goodman, Frank Calloway and Stan Draper among the founders, and gives their motive plainly: the meet was created to overcome the depression blues. A community that could do little about cattle prices or mine payrolls could still gather and bet small money pooled among neighbours. The founding group ran the races through 1937, after which the county helped by forming a Fair Board, with Tom Bath as its first chairman. A new track and grandstand followed in 1938, and that grandstand is documented as still in use.

That 1934 account should be left exactly there. A secondary layer describes racing at Ely reaching back into the nineteen twenties, and the two tellings do not agree; nothing settles whether informal racing predates the organised meet, so an honest history carries both layers and merges neither. The same discipline applies to anniversary language: a 2024 press layer billed ninety years of racing — that year’s billing, tied to the 1934 telling, not a founding computation to extend forward. The destination also bills the meet as the oldest horse racing event in Nevada: billing, carried as its publishers’ claim, without being hardened into a verified ranking. No edition number for the fair appears in the record, and none is claimed here. The Fair Board of 1937 likewise belongs to history alone, never blended with Agricultural District 13 into one continuous organiser.

What to Expect Across the Three Days

Racing from Friday Afternoon

The race meet opens the weekend. Post time on Friday is three in the afternoon, a late start that lets the working week end before the betting begins, while Saturday and Sunday settle into the more traditional one o’clock first post. Thoroughbreds and quarter horses both run, giving the card two kinds of contest: short, explosive quarter-horse sprints and longer thoroughbred races around the 1938 track. Because the wagering is pari-mutuel, the odds move with the crowd’s own money, and part of the pleasure is watching a small grandstand read a field together. First-time visitors need no expertise.

A Ranch Rodeo in the Friday Programme

Friday also carries the Ranch Rodeo in the published 2026 programme, built from working-ranch skills: bronc riding, barrel racing, roping and mutton bustin’ for the children, so the weekend begins with the county’s own riders. One boundary needs stating, because the same grounds host other riding events during the year: high-school rodeo here is a separate occasion on its own dates, and it forms no part of this fair weekend.

Exhibits, Auctions and the Space Between Races

Between post times, the fair side does the essential work of a county fair. The 4-H programme brings its exhibits, the product of a season of project work by the county’s young people, and the livestock side runs through to its auction. Around that core sit crafts and vendors, concessions and a bar, a barbecue associated in press coverage with the Ely Volunteer Fire Department, and live music across the three days. Older editions added colour of their own, including cooking and eating contests and, in the 2024 layer, a Sunday fun race involving a dinosaur costume and a mascot. Those touches belong to the years that published them, not to any later edition.

Planning Your Visit

Getting the Days Right

Timing is the main planning decision. A visitor with only one day faces a genuine choice: Friday offers free admission, the Ranch Rodeo and a three o’clock first post, while Saturday and Sunday offer the fuller fair day built around one o’clock racing for the five-dollar gate. No detailed timetable beyond those anchors is published, so let the card set the pace.

What It Costs, Stated Honestly

The money side is easy to state, because the record is short. For 2026, Friday admission is free and Saturday and Sunday admission is five dollars per person. No age tiers are published anywhere in the record found, so no children’s or senior price should be expected. The same pattern appeared in 2024 coverage, but each year’s figure belongs to its own year and should be checked against the current listing. Parking is the honest blank: no event-side parking price appears in any source, so neither a charge nor free parking can be promised. Wagering, food and drink are separate from the gate.

A Sample Saturday at the Races

Start with breakfast in Ely before the grounds stir. Reach the fairgrounds late in the morning, while the exhibits are open and the livestock pens are busy, and spend the first hour with the 4-H displays and vendor rows rather than at the rail. Take lunch from the concessions before the crowd thickens. Be trackside ahead of the one o’clock first post, pick a spot in the 1938 grandstand, and let the afternoon alternate: a race, a walk through the exhibits, another race, a cold drink. Stay through the later races and the livestock auction business.

Beds, Campgrounds and the Limits of the Record

No fair-side camping terms were found anywhere in the record, so anyone staying in a caravan or tent should treat Ely’s commercial campgrounds as town lodging on their own terms, not as fair camping. The same caution applies to listings describing this fair with generic assurances about parking or ceremonies; template coverage contributed nothing reliable here. Book early regardless: a small city hosting its biggest summer weekend fills its rooms.

How Ely’s Weekend Compares

Set beside Nevada’s larger fairs, the White Pine weekend is defined by what it refuses to separate. Big multi-attraction fairs commonly bolt a rodeo or a concert onto an exhibition programme for one evening; here the second headline is a full pari-mutuel race meet with a documented Depression-era origin, running all three days on its original track. Against other small county fairs, the difference is the betting rail: pooled wagering gives spectators a stake in every race. Visitors wanting a large midway or a week-long run will find a smaller, focused event — and that focus is the appeal.

A Fairgoer’s Checklist

• Confirm the current edition’s dates and post times before travelling, since each year’s listing is its own authority
• Use Friday for a free first look at the grounds, the Ranch Rodeo and the opening race card
• Carry cash for a five-dollar gate on Saturday and Sunday, plus whatever you choose to wager or spend inside
• Do not budget around any parking price or fair camping offer, because the record publishes neither
• Find the grounds by Fairview Lane and the Marich Softball Complex, not the other address forms in circulation
• Give the 1938 grandstand time, as part of the event’s documented fabric
• Leave room between races for the 4-H exhibits and the livestock auction, the fair’s other half
• Book Ely lodging early, and pack a warm layer for high-desert evenings

Beyond the Fairgrounds

Ely rewards the visitor who treats the fair as the centre of a longer stay. It is a historic mining and railroad city on the high desert of eastern Nevada, and its best-known attraction, the Nevada Northern Railway, runs excursion trains from its preserved East Ely yards. That railway is a separate draw: its excursions are not part of the fair’s programme, and make an excellent companion outing. The surrounding country is the other half of the appeal — some of the emptiest, highest ground in Nevada, Great Basin National Park within reach, and a drive in along famously lonely highways.

Why This Fair Matters to White Pine County

The significance of this weekend is written into its founding motive. A race meet organised in 1934 to lift a county’s spirits through the Depression was an act of collective stubbornness: ranchers and business people deciding that hard times were a reason to gather, not a reason to stop. The county’s Fair Board of 1937, and the track and grandstand built the year after, turned a morale project into permanent civic furniture. In a county of enormous distances and small settlements, one weekend where the whole community can be in the same place, showing its work and racing its horses, helps the county remain a community at all.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is the horse racing a separate event from the county fair?

No. The published event is one combined weekend under the name White Pine County Fair and Horse Races, with exhibits, livestock and vendors sharing the grounds and the three days with the race meet. Ely’s pages list separate organiser contacts for each side, but the visitor pays one admission to one event.

What does admission cost?

For the 2026 edition, admission on Friday is free and on Saturday and Sunday is five dollars per person, as published by both the state event record and Ely’s visitor pages. No reduced prices for children or seniors appear in the record, so none should be assumed. Prices belong to the year that publishes them, so check the current listing before a trip.

Can I bet on the races, and how does it work?

Yes. The racing is pari-mutuel: stakes are pooled among all the bettors on a race and divided among those who backed the finishers, so payouts follow the final odds set by the crowd’s own money. Thoroughbreds and quarter horses both run, with first post at three in the afternoon on Friday and one in the afternoon on Saturday and Sunday in 2026.

Is there camping or reserved parking at the fairgrounds?

The record publishes neither. No fair-side camping terms and no event parking price were found in any source, so camping should be arranged through Ely’s commercial sites as ordinary town lodging, and parking treated as unpriced in the record rather than promised as free. Anyone needing certainty should ask the county’s fairgrounds contacts directly.

What to Expect From the Next White Pine County Nevada Fair Festival

How often is the White Pine County Nevada Fair Festival held?

The fair and race meet form an annual late-August fixture, held once a year as a single three-day weekend, Friday through Sunday. That rhythm is long established on the destination and county record, stretching back through the organised racing documented from the nineteen thirties, even though the fair carries no published edition number.

When is the next White Pine County Nevada Fair Festival?

Following the pattern the event keeps, the next edition falls in late August of the coming year, across a Friday-to-Sunday weekend at the fairgrounds in Ely. Its exact dates are its own to publish, and should be taken from its current listing rather than projected from the 2026 weekend.

Will the dates change?

Within their season, yes, they can. The weekend is anchored to late August rather than to fixed calendar dates, so the specific Friday, Saturday and Sunday move as the calendar moves, and the organisers can shift the weekend within that window. The stable facts are the season, the three-day shape and the Ely grounds; precise dates should be confirmed against each year’s listing.

Closing

The White Pine County Fair and Horse Races asks little of its visitors: a late-August weekend, five dollars on two of its three days, and a willingness to let horse racing and county exhibiting share the same afternoon. What it offers in return is rarer than its size suggests — a living pari-mutuel meet born of the Depression, a grandstand from 1938 still doing its job, and a whole county gathered in one place. Ely is worth the stop.