Ol’ Blue Eyes had golden moment on Kauai

You could say the Kauai County Farm Bureau Fair was Frank Sinatra’s lucky charm. In 1952 the legendary crooner hit rock bottom. The movie "Meet Danny Wilson," in which he played the lead, bombed at the box office. Only 150 people came to see his performance at Chez Paree, Chicago’s largest nightclub. Empty seats outnumbered fans at his concert at the Paramount Theatre in New York.

Adding insult to injury, CBS canceled Sinatra’s television show, and Columbia Records and his talent agency, MCA, dropped him. Show biz insiders agreed nothing short of a miracle could resurrect his career. In April 1952 Sinatra headlined a series of concerts at various venues in Hawaii, including Kauai’s fair. True to his suave image, he took the stage in a tuxedo even for that appearance.

The late Buck Buchwach, former editor of The Honolulu Advertiser and a close friend of Sinatra’s, was there. "It was raining … and the dilapidated tent was leaking," Buchwach recalled in Nancy Sinatra’s book about her father, "Frank Sinatra: An American Legend."

"‘For just a second,’ Frank told me, ‘I wondered if the show really did have to go on. Then I peeked out at the audience. There were a few hundred, tops. They weren’t wearing fancy clothes or expensive jewelry. They wore aloha shirts, jeans, muumuus and such. Homey. Their warmth and friendliness smacked me in the face. And when two brown-skinned young girls gave me a couple of handmade leis and little kisses, I almost broke down.’"

Buchwach continued, "Frank went on and sang, song after song, hit after hit, maybe 20. I was stunned. It was fantastic; it was 1,000 percent for small-town ticket holders with big hearts and hands that grew red from clapping.

"Afterward, Frank had tears in his eyes. ‘Buck,’ he told me, ‘I sang the best I know how. Those people deserved it. It’s a night I’ll never forget. Tonight marks the first night on the way back. I can feel it in every bone.’ From that moment, everything seemed to go right for him."

Nearly 60 years later the magic of Kauai’s largest annual event endures. Launched in the 1920s, it supports the efforts of the Kauai County Farm Bureau, which includes Kauai Grown, a program that promotes agricultural products cultivated on the island.

Jerry Ornellas is the farm bureau’s vice president, the owner of Jerry’s Farm, a 15-acre tropical fruit farm in Kapaa and the chairman of the fair’s construction committee. A retired agricultural research technician for the Kauai station of the University of Hawaii’s College of Tropical Agriculture and Human Resources, he has been one of the fair’s mainstays for a decade.

"Kauai is still largely a rural place, so we don’t have as many opportunities for entertainment as people living in urban areas do," Ornellas said. "The fair is like a great tribal gathering. People from all over the island come; in fact, many of them come more than one day! You see people there you haven’t seen in a year, and the reason you know that is because the last time you saw them was at the fair."

This year’s theme, "We Are Family," is apropos for an event that Ornellas says draws some 35,000 people — nearly half of Kauai’s population. Diversions include a petting zoo, keiki talent contest, a cook-off featuring locally grown ingredients, the Meadow Gold Healthy Baby contest, booths showcasing the wares and causes of 70 vendors and nonprofit and community groups, and exhibits of livestock, ornamental plants, floral arrangements and produce.

"Many people on Kauai have roots in agriculture," Ornellas said. "They grew up on a farm or had friends or relatives who farmed. For the Fruit and Vegetable Show, commercial farmers and backyard growers bring the very best of their crops to be judged. The categories are wide open — everything from bananas and cucumbers to exotic items like longan and bittermelon. Visitors are amazed. They don’t know what some of those fruits and vegetables are, and it’s funny to eavesdrop on conversations because local people sometimes don’t even know what they are!"

Each entry is judged, and ribbons and monetary prizes are awarded to the winners. On Saturday night the produce is divided into boxes and auctioned.

Ornellas has served as auctioneer for five years.

"What’s great is a lot of kids get involved, not only by attending the fair, but by volunteering to work," Ornellas said. "For instance, members of Kauai High School’s Junior ROTC are the parking attendants. Pop Warner teams sponsor food booths to raise money for uniforms, equipment and other things. The kids from 4-H run the petting zoo and raise sheep, cattle and pigs for display and sale at the fair."

About 1,500 volunteers keep the fair running smoothly. Some have been taking tickets at the gate, staffing booths, entering the Fruit and Vegetable Show and helping with cleanup and other chores for more than 60 years.

"Volunteers are important not only because we couldn’t get things done without them, but because working shoulder to shoulder to accomplish something good is important to the health of the community," Ornellas said. "Basically, what we’ve done is create this little city, and it takes on a life of its own."

Beyond the fun is an educational component, which Ornellas believes can shape Kauai’s future. "We want people to discover the importance of agriculture at the fair," he said. "We especially want the kids to learn about it to inspire the next generation of farmers and ranchers. Years from now we hope they will remember all the wonderful experiences they had and how they got their start at the fair."