McKenzie County North Dakota Fair Festival
Watford City’s county fair has two addresses in its record, and the difference is the story. For generations it ran on a cramped east-side fairgrounds, behind a five-dollar button, until the Bakken boom outgrew it. In June 2023 the fair moved west to the brand-new McKenzie County Ag Expo on the Highway 85 bypass, arriving as the new facility’s very first event and cutting its ribbon during its own Bulls and Broncs night. The result is a June fair of draft horses, youth livestock, rodeo and derby in a building the fair itself opened.
About the Fair
The fair’s published name is simply the McKenzie County Fair. Watford City’s own community page states the standing arrangement: the fair is held in June of each year at the McKenzie County Ag Expo and features 4-H competition, carnival rides, NDRA Rodeo, demolition derby and more. It runs in June in the modern record, 2021 through 2026; the fair’s own site carries the 2026 edition under the theme “Stars, Stripes & Fair Nights,” with a concert by Chancey Williams and flyers for the Ranch Rodeo, the Demolition Derby and Bares, Broncs, & Bulls; before the move, the fair belonged to July.
Quick Facts
| Item | Documented record |
| Event name | McKenzie County Fair |
| Fair town | Watford City, the county seat |
| Current grounds | McKenzie County Ag Expo, since 2023 |
| Grounds address | 12880 25th Street Northwest, Watford City |
| Season | June in the modern record; July before 2021 |
| 2025 edition | June 18 to 21, billed the 66th Annual, Mardi Gras theme |
| Operating body | McKenzie County Fair Board, in the press record |
| Programme core | 4-H and FFA livestock, draft horses, rodeo, derby, parade, carnival |
| Grounds admission | Free in 2023 to 2025 layers; unpublished for 2026 |
| Former grounds | McKenzie County Fairgrounds, east side of town, through 2022 |
Who Runs the Fair
In the press record, the fair’s operating body is the McKenzie County Fair Board, a volunteer board. Its named people stand in their own years only: Tim Nelson was its president in the 2012 layer, Janel Lee was a board member quoted through the 2018 edition, and Carolyn Levang appears as a board member in 2018 and as Fair Board Secretary and Treasurer in 2022. Extension agents run the 4-H and Open Class static-exhibit programme alongside it — Marcia Hellandsaas’s in the 2023 layer — a youth and exhibits role, never the fair itself.
Two other name forms stand unmerged with the board. A nonprofit registry lists a body styled “Mckenzie County Fair” as a 501(c)(3) organisation hosting agricultural and livestock events; no layer equates it with the Fair Board. The name “McKenzie County Fair Association” appears only as a named annual sponsor of the Ag Expo in the Expo’s own 2026 layers. The Ag Expo is the county-owned venue that houses the fair, directed by Chris Kubal, who also appears as a 2023 contact for the memorial draft-horse event — never a board title. Travis Kubal of 223 Promotions, the demolition-derby promoter, is a different person entirely. The NDRA and the carnival companies, North Star Amusements in the older layers and Funtime Carnivals in 2023 to 2025, are never organisers. The county’s absence from the state’s 2025 resiliency grant list proves nothing against the fair.
History of the Fair
The old McKenzie County Fairgrounds stood on Watford City’s east side, at 4th Avenue Southeast and 12th Street Southeast in the 2018 fair layer, with its Homemaker Building and multi-purpose building. Its documented July editions there run from 2011 to the “60th annual” fair of July 5 to 8 in 2018, and it was still on the old grounds in June 2022, billed the “63rd Annual McKenzie County Fair & Rodeo.”
For a useful comparison, see the McIntosh County North Dakota Tri-County Fair Festival for another county festival.
The county approved the forty-million-dollar Ag Expo project and bought its site in spring 2021; ground was broken on September 29, 2021. When it opened, the fair opened it: the June 14 to 17, 2023 fair, billed the 64th Annual, was the Expo’s debut event, its grand opening held during the fair’s Bulls & Broncs. Those billings do not add up year for year — three editions across the four years from 2018 to 2022, against annual steps either side — and the discrepancy stands exactly as published, unexplained. No founding year is published, and none is back-calculated; a board member’s 2018 recollection that “it all started in a field” beside Watford Creek is an anecdote, not a founding date. Watford City has been the county seat since 1940; that is city history, not the fair’s.
What to Expect
The Draft Horses Open the Week
The fair’s signature bill is the Olaf Leiseth Jr. Memorial Draft Horse Competition, named for Olaf Leiseth Jr., who died in 2007 and was wagon master of the Long X Wagon Train. Documented at the fair in 2012, 2014, 2023, 2024 and 2025, it runs as an obstacle course with log sledding and a swamper race. In the Ag Expo years it has opened the fair, on Wednesday evening in both 2024 and 2025, with admission free in those layers where stated; 2023 spread the horse work across Friday and Saturday. For 2026, the Draft Horse Pulls scheduled for June 17 were cancelled by the fair itself for inclement weather, and stand as a cancellation, never as a held event.
Livestock Mornings and the Friday Sale
Mornings belong to the young exhibitors. In 2025, 4-H and FFA livestock events ran every morning from 8 until noon, and the 2023 fair’s Friday carried the 4-H and FFA swine, sheep and goat shows. The week peaks with the Friday livestock sale, at 1 in the afternoon in the 2025 programme, on a day whose gates opened at 7 for the FFA Livestock Jackpot. Static exhibits stay on display throughout the grounds, in Open Class divisions that ran from Fiber Arts to Quilting and Horticulture in 2023.
Parades, Rodeos and Derby Nights
The fair still takes its parade into town: from 4th and Main at 4 in the afternoon on the Thursday of 2025, and down Main Street in 2023. Thursday evening in 2025 belonged to the Ranch Rodeo at 7, with live music by Lendon James. The Demolition Derby filled Friday evening in 2025 at 6, with the Power Wheels Derby for youngsters inside the bill and music by Wildwinds afterwards. The NDRA Rodeo closes the big nights, headlining Saturday at 7 in 2025 with music by BJ Jamison after it; in 2023 it followed a youth rodeo, and that year’s Thursday belonged to Bulls & Broncs from 6 until 9.
Carnival, Themes and the Smallest Fairgoers
The Funtime Carnival ran daily through the 2025 fair, with strolling acts and a Tot Zone for the youngest visitors; North Star Amusements served the older east-side years. Saturday in 2025 brought crafting classes with Jessie Veeder, and Friday the Fair Olympics at 4. Themes run from “Find Your Happy” in 2017 and “A Family Tradition” in 2021 to “Tropical Fairadise,” “Mardi Gras” and, for 2026, “Stars, Stripes & Fair Nights,” whose headline concert is Chancey Williams.
Planning Your Visit
Getting to the Ag Expo
Aim for the west side of Watford City, not the east. The current grounds are the McKenzie County Ag Expo at 12880 25th Street Northwest, Watford City, North Dakota 58854, a county-owned facility on the Highway 85 bypass, on grounds of about 211 to 212 acres — the layers’ two approximations, standing unmerged. The building covers 112,000 square feet with its exhibit hall, livestock expo building, outdoor arena and grandstand for 2,300. The old fairgrounds address belongs to history through 2022; ignore stale listings naming it.
Dates and Gate Times
Recent runs are June 12 to 15 in 2024 and June 18 to 21 in 2025. For 2026, the fair’s own site fixes activity on Wednesday, June 17, while listing layers carry a June 18 to 20 span; the two stand unmerged, so confirm the current year’s dates before travelling.
Admission, in Two Eras
At the Ag Expo, admission to the grounds was free in three successive documented years: the 2023 layer states that general admission to the fair is free, and the 2024 and 2025 layers state that admission to the grounds is free. Headline events could still be priced: in 2023, and in 2023 only, admission prices for all events were published at twenty dollars for adults, ten dollars for ages 7 to 12, and free admission for those 6 and under, covering that year’s evening-event slate of Bulls & Broncs, demolition derby and NDRA Rodeo. Event prices for 2024 and 2025 beyond the free draft horse show, and any price for 2026, are unpublished, so the fair is not called free for 2026 here. At the old fairgrounds, the button era ran on a five-dollar fair button good for all three days, documented in 2011, 2012, 2014 and 2017, with children 6 and under free and the rodeo and derby separately ticketed at ten dollars for adults and five dollars for children; the 2014 button included the beef barbecue, whose free status in its years is an element, never proof that button-era admission was free. No price is published for 2018, and no parking price is published in any layer.
Staying Over
The Ag Expo’s own site lists RV camping among the facility’s amenities, and that is all that may be said: no fair-week camping rule, price, reservation term or fair-specific offer is published in any fair layer; do not read the amenity as a promise of hookups, sites or fair-week availability. Old-grounds camping is likewise undocumented, and area campgrounds in the recreation layers are separate facilities, none of them fair camping.
A Sample Day at the Fair
Build a day on the shape of the fullest recent edition, Friday in 2025. Start at the rings for the morning’s 4-H and FFA livestock events, then stay for the livestock sale at 1 in the afternoon. Take the Fair Olympics at 4, and give the evening to the Demolition Derby at 6, with the Power Wheels Derby inside the bill and music by Wildwinds after the last heat.
How This Fair Compares
Most fairs in this series stayed where they began; this one moved, and the move is its distinction. It left an east-side fairgrounds it had outgrown, opened a forty-million-dollar county facility as that facility’s first event, and carried its oldest signatures — a memorial draft horse show named for a wagon-train wagon master, a parade down Main Street, habits formed behind a five-dollar button — intact into the new building. Its money record is two-sided too: free recent grounds, a priced 2023 evening slate.
Visitor Checklist
- Confirm the current year’s dates; no full 2026 run is published in the fair’s own fetched text
- Navigate to the Ag Expo on the Highway 85 bypass, not to the old east-side fairgrounds
- Treat free grounds admission as documented for 2023 to 2025 only
- Budget for headline events separately in any year that publishes an event ladder
- Check the weather notices; the fair itself cancelled its June 17, 2026 Draft Horse Pulls
- Give a morning to the livestock programme and the Friday sale
- Stay late at least once for the rodeo, ranch rodeo or demolition derby under the lights
- If you plan to camp, confirm terms directly; no fair-week camping terms are published
Beyond the Festival Grounds
Watford City meets its fair halfway. The parade leaves the grounds and rolls down Main Street, as it did on the Thursday of the 2023 fair, so the town centre stays inside the fair’s geography. The older fair belonged wholly to the east side, and the new address — 12880 25th Street Northwest — measures how far the fair, and the oil-boom town around it, have travelled.
Why This Fair Matters
This fair matters because its record shows a community refusing to let growth shrink its gathering. The county paper watched attendance quadruple on grounds that could not stretch, and the county answered with the largest investment in its history. Its centre has not moved: young exhibitors in the mornings, neighbours’ quilts and photographs, and a draft horse show carrying a wagon master’s name.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is the fair free to enter?
Admission to the grounds was free in the three documented Ag Expo years of 2023, 2024 and 2025. That does not make every element or every year free: in 2023 the evening events carried their own admission of twenty dollars for adults and ten dollars for ages 7 to 12, with those 6 and under free, and no price is published for 2026.
Where is the fair held now?
The fair is held at the McKenzie County Ag Expo, 12880 25th Street Northwest, Watford City, on the Highway 85 bypass, its home since June 2023. The old fairgrounds on the east side of town hosted it through 2022 and is not its current home.
When is the fair held?
The fair is a June event in the modern record, held in June of each year in the city’s standing words. Recent editions ran June 14 to 17 in 2023 and June 18 to 21 in 2025. The July dates in the record belong to the pre-2021 fair.
What happened to the draft horse pulls in 2026?
The fair announced in its own weather notice that the Draft Horse Pulls scheduled for June 17, 2026 had been cancelled due to inclement weather. The memorial draft horse competition documented in earlier years is a separate bill.
What to Expect From the Next McKenzie County North Dakota Fair Festival
How often is McKenzie County North Dakota Fair Festival held?
It is an annual event, staged once each year at Watford City, and the modern record documents it every June from 2021 through 2026.
When is the next McKenzie County North Dakota Fair Festival?
The next edition is expected in June, most recently June 18 to 21 in 2025, with June activity documented in 2026 but no full run published. Confirm the exact dates in the fair’s own announcements before travelling.
Will the dates change?
The exact days do move from year to year within June. The documented editions fall on June 14 to 17 in 2023, June 12 to 15 in 2024 and June 18 to 21 in 2025, so the June shape holds while the calendar dates shift. The season itself has moved once, from July to June, so verify the individual dates each year.
Closing
The McKenzie County Fair is best understood as a fair that carried its town with it. It kept its draft horses, its parade, its youth livestock and its derby nights, traded an outgrown east-side fairgrounds for a county showplace it was trusted to open, and publishes its prices, themes and weather cancellations in plain sight. A visitor who comes to Watford City in June will find the fair the city promises, gathered at the Ag Expo on the bypass.
