Mangus Moore, a 74-year-old retired brick skidder, blew out the brick skid competition at the "Hit the Bricks" Street Fair with a time of five minutes and 40 seconds.
The competition was a way for community members to see the skill at work, while also making a historical comeback for the trade, which hasn't been seen in competition for 20 years, Callaway County Commissioner Doc Kritzer said. The non-automated task requires brick skidders to remove 380 bricks from a cart and place them in a particular configuration on a pallet, which keeps the bricks together, Kritzer said.
For the Fulton competition participants paid a $10 entry fee, while others donated to raise funds for The Food Bank's Buddy Pack program, which provides kid-friendly and nutritious foods to students during weekends and holidays. The event raised $360 for the program, street fair chairman Jannell Austin said.
Ron Lepley, a brick skidder at A.P. Green Factories organized the event and provided three separate demonstrations of brick skidding. During one of his demonstrations he clocked in at five minutes and 24 seconds, but since he wasn't entered into the competition, Moore was named the official winner, Kritzer said.
The official times for those who competed in the brick skidding competition are:
Mangus Moore at 5 minutes and 40 seconds,
Thomas Hughes at 6 minutes and 45 seconds,
Gerald Chambers at 6 minutes and 49 seconds,
Jared Frickey at 7 minutes and 29 seconds,
Jason Luther at 7 minutes and 32 seconds for his first attempt and 6 minutes and 34 seconds for his second attempt,
Charles McClellend at 8 minutes,
David Jett at 8 minutes and 57 seconds,
Matt Gowin at 11 minutes and 1 second,
Randy Kleindienst at 11 minutes and 50 seconds
Star Elder at 12 minutes and 48 seconds for her first attempt and 11 minutes and 59 seconds for her second attempt.
For winning the competition, Moore was presented with 50% of the competition's entry fees ($50), which he also donated to the Buddy Pack program.
"The street fair is about giving to all these charities and helping the community," Kritzer said. "It's all about having fun because we're crazy people around here."
Kritzer expects to bring the brick skidding competition back next year.
Another new event at this year's street fair was the tug-of-war competition, which brought eight teams to the Memorial Park field to battle it out in a mud pit. The winning team was Central Mo Meat and Sausage. The event proved popular and the committee is brainstorming ideas to get more people involved by including an additional bracket so teams that lose the first round still have a chance to battle out against each other, Kritzer said.
To raise money for next year's street fair, the street fair committee sold "Hit the Bricks" buttons, which had a number on the back that was added to a hopper so button owners could win various prizes throughout the week leading up to the fair. Numbers selected during the fair garnered larger prizes, Kritzer said.
Based on an estimation of sales by food and street vendors, 13,000 people attended, Austin said.