Museum earns awards for parade float

The New Mexico Farm & Ranch Heritage Museum received two major awards for its float in the New Mexico State Fair Parade on Sept. 8.

The Museum received the Governor's Most Extraordinary Award, as well as the Most Spectacular Award. The theme for the parade was "Ropin', Ridin' and Rodeo: 50 Years of Tingley Coliseum," and the Museum's award-winning float was organized and put together by Shawnna Brown, the executive director of the Farm & Ranch Heritage Foundation.

The large float was pulled by a tractor-trailer rig and included a variety of characters and displays that matched the parade theme. The state's main cultures were represented and other characters included a trick roper, cowboy and farmer, and a tight-rope walker under a striped tent to represent Tingley Coliseum's circus history.

Objects featured on the float included a wishing well, a wool-spinning wheel, an 1800s fringe-top surrey that had been used to carry dignitaries in Tingley for many years, an old-fashioned ice cream cart, 10x10 cardboard cutout of Brown's husband, Jim Dewey Brown, riding a bronc, and cutouts of Roy Rogers and Dale Evans. Rogers had been one of the first stars to appear at Tingley.