SHERMAN COUNTY AG SOCIETY
The Sherman County Agricultural Society is looking to raise funds for several improvements to the VFW Hall at the Sherman County Fairgrounds, and a mountain oyster and pulled pork meal on Saturday, March 29th, from 5:00 until 10:00 p.m., is planned to kick-off fundraising.
The event will involve a meal, as well as a silent auction and raffle, with all proceeds to go towards the first phase of the improvements: renovations to the VFW Hall’s bathrooms.
Believed to have been built in the mid-to-late-1930s, the hall has been a site for countless fairs, receptions, and reunions over the course of almost 100 years.
“It’s a pretty historical building,” noted Ag Society Secretary Krista Slobaszewski in an interview last week. “It does have some architecture in it from the thirties, with solid wood floors, and just a lot of history.”
Slobaszewski believed the structure had been built using federal funds from the Works Progress Administration—a New Deal agency that employed jobseekers affected by the Great Depression in public works projects like constructing buildings and roads.
“That’s what the old-timers tell us, anyway,” she noted.
In addition to using the hall during the Sherman County Fair, the Sherman County Ag Society rents out the hall regularly for events. Slobaszewski said that the building has long been a community staple and an important source of revenue for the local ag society.
“Anybody who’s grown up around Sherman County has surely attended a polka dance or reception or some kind of party or event at the hall,” she said. “Usually, every weekend we have something going on out there.”
Slobaszewski said last week that parts of the structure—particularly the bathrooms—are in need of an upgrade.
“We think the bathrooms were added in 1970,” said the secretary, “and we don’t believe there have been any updates to them since then.
“We are going to start by updating the bathrooms, putting in new lighting, flooring, sinks,” she added. “That’s our first project.”
That project is estimated to cost “between fourteen- and fifteen-thousand dollars.”
Following the completion of the bathroom upgrades, the ag society also hopes to update the VFW Hall’s kitchen, installing “new flooring, cupboards, countertops, and a larger sink,” and “making it more useable for roasters” in general. That phase of the project is estimated to cost “about $45,000.”
Slobaszewski said that the ag society was also looking at further projects, like “replacing some of the exterior doors…to help with the heat bills” down the road. But for now, bathroom and kitchen improvements are the focus.
The secretary said the possibility of constructing a new building to replace the VFW Hall had been broached, but noted that the current economy, and the VFW Hall’s historic nature, had led the ag society to favor renovation.
“With the cost of new construction and the history that the VFW Hall has, we just think that going this route and retaining the hall’s history is a better route, and a better use of our money,” she said.
At its kick-off mountain oyster meal, meals will cost twenty-five dollars for adults aged twenty-one and over, fifteen dollars for those between the ages of eight and twenty, and will be free for those seven and under.
“We’ll have mountain oysters and pulled pork sandwiches, and chips and beans and all the usual; it will be a meal,” Slobaszewski said. “And we will have silent auctions from items donated from around the area, as well as raffles and all kinds of fun.”
The Sherman County Ag Society is still looking for donations for the upcoming event. Those, said Slobaszewski, may be dropped off with Slobaszewski at Ken’s Equipment at 1110 O Street in Loup City.
Any funds raised by the ag society at the meal, up to a cap of $5,000, will be matched by the Sherman County Community Foundation through its Anytime Grant.
The secretary said that the Anytime Grant stipulates that the bathroom project has to be completed this year.
“For the matching grant for the foundation, we have to do the bathroom in 2025,” she said. “We have to have it completed by the end of the year.
“The bathrooms are a smaller project than the kitchen, and we are hoping we can get them done easily.”
Following the mountain oyster meal, the society plans “to do fundraising throughout the year,” moving on to fundraising for the kitchen renovation after the bathroom costs are met.
By “sprucing up” the bathrooms and, later, making renovations to the kitchen, Slobaszewski said the ag society hopes to maintain the VFW Hall as a fixture for fairs, receptions, and other events for years to come.
