Artists Mike Kasun of Elkhorn and Matt Zumbo of Franklin look at their sculpture in the Ziegler Family Exposition Center lobby at the building’s unveiling Sunday afternoon at Washington County Fair Park. Ziegler building donors can purchase spots on the mural.

The Washington County Fair Park grounds were quiet Sunday. No animal exhibits, no commercial vendors, no big ticket bands for the upcoming 150th anniversary fair.

Not yet.

A few people worked behind the new Ziegler Family Exposition Center to spread wood shavings and sawdust in the pig and steer stalls, getting a head start on a week of work.

"The cleaning is not so fun," said Alissa Rauh, 13, of Slinger, who helped her family make ready for 12 pigs and seven steers from their farms.

The Rauh family has been a fixture at the county fair for years: Rauh’s father, Jeff, has set up animal exhibits for 34 years. Jeff’s father, Erwin, has exhibited for longer still.

The animals come Tuesday, Rauh said. The pigs shouldn’t be too much trouble to move, she said, but the steers can give her some attitude.

The auctions are the highlight of the exhibits, Rauh said. After their work is rewarded, the Rauhs get a few months of break, then start preparing for the next year’s fair.

While the Rauhs prepared for their exhibits, county officials and donors celebrated the unveiling of the $1.6 million, 26,000 square-foot Ziegler expo center, a facility that’s been in the works since before the fair moved from Slinger in 1999, said Nancy Justman, park executive director.

With workers painting and putting last-minute touches on it Friday, a hint of fresh-paint smell wafted in the air Sunday during tours of the building.

The center has been a long time coming, said Margaret Ziegler, whose family donated $250,000 to the project.

"That’s all right," Ziegler said. "They’re doing it right."

The expo concept began as a horse arena, Ziegler said, but the finished product will be more versatile. A soundproof divider wall, which will be ready next month, can bisect the expo floor into two areas, 14,000 and 10,000 square feet, to hold simultaneous events.

The fair’s commercial exhibitors will move into the expo center Tuesday, enjoying for the first time an indoor, climate-controlled environment, Justman said. The expo is not yet done, she said, and Fair Park management hopes to raise $300,000 more in donations.

About 90 vendors will move into the building for fair week with about another 45 occupying tents, County Fair Manager Sandy Lang said Friday. The total is an increase from last year’s 125 vendors, she said.

Wall art in the expo center’s lobby gives the fair park one avenue of fundraising. Plasma-cut steel and brass shapes form images of 4-H logos, horses and tractors. Donors can claim pieces of the art with placards bearing their names, said artist Mike Kasun of Elkhorn.

"(The wall art) represents everything we do here," Kasun said.