Carnival keeps on trucking

Staff report

It's getting harder to move a carnival around the country and still make money, Mac Chris said.

Chris, the general manager of the Inland Empire Shows carnival that is in Carson City through Sunday, said the cost of gas is becoming "unimaginable."

He and 100 employees move a carnival of rides packed into 18 semi-trucks to 33 different towns between February and October - a carnival that gets its electricity from two diesel-powered generators.

He said the carnival remains popular, though.

"It's still family," said, Chris, 61, who wore an American flag shirt on Friday. "They're nostalgic. They're just family fun. You remember when you were a kid and the fun that you had and you want your kids to share the merry-go-round or share the tilt-a-whirl."

But the carnival is not quite as popular as it was when he started taking tickets and working rides at the carnival as a teenager in the 1960s.

"With video games and television and hot tubs," he said, "the entertainment dollar has been stretched a lot of different directions."

But Mike Hughes, development director for the Retired and Senior Volunteer Program, which has hosted the carnival at Mills Park for 16 years, said it is still popular.

"This is a family even and Carson City expects it," he said.

Chris said the carnival schedule can be hard, but the 100 workers there try to keep a routine.

"We do the same habits that other people do," he said. "(We know) in the next town, this is who the laundry man is, this is who the toilet man is, this is who the trash man is, this is who the sheriff is, and we have relationships with all of them because we work with them."

Employees don't just work rides either, he said. One of their biggest concerns is safety because "we're in an Elizabeth Smart world."

Ride safety is also important, he said, and they regularly check the machines to make sure they're OK.

But rides are not the only thing that attract people.

Aurelia and Larry Ewing of Carson City came to shop at the rows of vendor tents in the park.

They said they didn't plan on riding anything, though.

"We're too old for those," Larry said.