By 11 a.m. on Saturday, large groups of people were filing through the front gate of the 29th Annual Santa Clarita Cowboy Festival at William S. Hart Park in Newhall. Many were decked out in their cowboy and cowgirl duds.
The event might as well be dubbed Santa Clarita’s own Renaissance Faire, but western themed. It was like Disneyland, but instead of guests wearing Mickey Mouse ears, Tinker Bell buttons and “Star Wars” T-shirts, those who got into the Cowboy Festival spirit donned cowboy hats, belt buckles and button-up cowboy and cowgirl shirts.
“I love that,” said Santa Clarita Mayor Pro Tem Laurene Weste in an interview at the event on Saturday afternoon. “We want to do more of that here. We want to have more events where you can enjoy stepping back in time. How lucky were we to have such a special atmosphere today? A lot of smiles, a lot of joy.”
Placerita Canyon resident Sarah Stevens and her family came dressed in cowboy hats for the event.
“It’s better than Disneyland,” Stevens said. “It’s free.”
She added that she and her family have attended the Cowboy Festival for years. They got to Hart Park on Saturday morning when it opened at 10, and after a couple hours had already enjoyed plenty of western-themed entertainment and activities. By noon, they were finishing up some midway games, which included the Saloon Shootout, the Snake in the Boot snake toss, the Roundup Rope Toss and the Strike Gold game where participants tossed rocks into pie pans.
Castaic resident Lita Tabb was at the mechanical bull ride with her three kids. Aria, her 7-year-old daughter, stayed on the bull for the whole 100 seconds without getting thrown. Aria said it was easy. She’s used to it, adding that she rides real horses, which is more difficult.
Aria’s 9-year-old brother, Anze, gave it a try, too. He said the saddle was slippery and found it difficult to stay on it. His mom said she wondered if the saddle was oiled. The youngest of the group, 1-year-old Arlo, didn’t take a ride on the bull, but he enjoyed running around.
Many people were nearly running for the peach cobbler over at the Rotary Club of Santa Clarita Valley’s Cowboy Chuck Wagon. Valencia resident and Rotary member Patrick Kenney was one of many Rotary members helping with the cobbler and serving cowboy coffee over hot coals. The coffee, Kenney said, is a secret recipe, but very strong, very black and likely to keep those who consume it up all night.
“But we have some people who say they come just for the peach cobbler,” he said. “We even have people who come from Orange County to the Cowboy Festival. They say, ‘It’s the peach cobbler we want.’”
According to Kenney and others, the group was expecting to make around 3,000 tins of cobbler, which they baked in several Dutch ovens in a sort of campsite setting.
Tujunga resident Barbara Mohorc was lined up for the cobbler. She said she’d heard about it from a friend in Arcadia who’d learned about it somehow.
“She said, ‘You need to get the peach cobbler. It’s the big thing over there,’” Mohorc said.
Patricia Camero came from San Fernando for the cobbler. She’d heard about it on social media.
There was plenty of live music around Hart Park at various stages. To quote the 1980 film “The Blues Brothers,” the event offered both kinds of music: “country and western.” They even had bluegrass and yodelers.
And the food? Barbecue, tacos, sausage, southern desserts, freshly squeezed lemonade and so much more were offered throughout the park. People were lined up to come and get it.
Kids got the chance to mine for gold, pedal tractors and even see what it’s like to do laundry on a washboard. Adults could try their hands at archery and hatchet throwing. And there were plenty of vendors to pick up cowboy and cowgirl gear.
Families could pose for authentic collodion tintype pictures at The Lanternist booth. According to Sharon Schnittker, she and her husband, Matt Schnittker, of Schnittker Photography, were using 1800s lenses and chemistry to shoot and develop the images right there in their cart.
“We’ve been doing this (tintype photography) about six years,” Schnittker said. “It started out as our child’s eighth-grade project.”
People could even pose in pictures with cowboy reenactors, who were walking around the park. Some of these reenactors, as they called themselves, were part of living history exhibits at the event.
According to Tyler Anderson, Simi Valley resident and member of the Historical Unit of Southern California, he and his group of reenactors were portraying figures of the Mexican Revolution. They had a camp set up in the park with tents, a blanket with their mess kits and weaponry laid out, coffee brewing, a guitar player and Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa himself telling stories of the day.
“This is 1916,” said Tyler Mesa of La Crescenta and member of HUSC. “We’re Pancho Villa’s guys. We’re being hunted by (United States Army Gen. John J.) Pershing.”
Mesa added, sadly, that the American troops in the group were out getting lunch. But plenty of guests were enjoying the piece of living history as it was and listening to stories about, for example, Villa’s raid on the border town of Columbus, New Mexico.
The Cowboy Festival is set to continue from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Sunday.
Weste said she loves how the event transports visitors to a time of western tradition and frontier fun. As it seemed with others, she enjoyed getting into the cowboy spirit.
“This is the weekend we get to play cowboys and cowgirls,” she said. “And we wear the duds and do the dance and lean in and say, ‘Howdy,’ and smile and get lassoed. I just never have more fun.”
For more information about the event, go to CowboyFestival.org.
