Jasper County Fair awarded $700K grant for youth learning center

Jasper County Fairgrounds has been awarded a generous $700,000 grant from the Geisler-Penquite Foundation to go towards the construction of a new youth learning center, which will host fair projects and other educational opportunities and events throughout the year when fully completed.

According to the press release announcing the grant acquisition, the funds are the result of a partnership between the Geisler-Penquite Foundation and the Jasper County Agricultural Society, which is the entity that owns the fairgrounds. The fair itself is managed by the nonprofit Jasper County Fair Board.

“It is deeply gratifying to help breathe life into this important fairgrounds revitalization project,” Dan Skokan, president of Geisler-Penquite Foundation Board, said. “This project is in perfect alignment with the Geisler and Penquite families’ educational desires and dreams for the Jasper County community.”

Geisler-Penquite Foundation established in 2009 but its roots date to 1969 when the Geisler Penquite Charitable Corporation was created by the Jasper County farm family of John E. and Gertrude Setzer Geisler and their children, Cecil Geisler Penquite and her husband Loren and Harold Geisler and his wife Mavis.

Since then the distribution of the family’s farm holdings and investments have resulted in grants totaling nearly $9 million to Central College and 16 Jasper County nonprofits whose missions align close with the family’s values of hard work, diligence, a love for learning and strong adherence to Christian principles.

Jasper County Fair Board’s mission of providing resources, engagement opportunities and support to promote the growth and development of all Jasper County residents — especially youth — and the preservation of the area’s agricultural heritage certainly aligned with Geisler-Penquite Foundation’s values.

Roger Zaabel, president of the Jasper County Fair Board, said there is a lot of pride taken in fairgrounds facilities, but the board is often limited on funds.

“So to have the Geisler-Penquite Foundation see the value in our efforts and generously award us a grant of this magnitude is humbling,” Zaabel said. “This investment will help us transform the physical layout of the fairgrounds and, more importantly, show our youth that we are investing in them.”

Currently, the plan is to have the Geisler-Penquite Youth Learning Center built and ready by the 2025 Jasper County Fair.

Geisler-Penquite Foundation recently made headlines for partnering with Jasper Conservation Connection — the friends group for Jasper County Conservation —to fully fund a $700,000 Geisler-Penquite Land Stewardship Lab for the second phase of the upcoming environmental education center project.

Funds will go towards the creation of an outdoor recreation center and prairie production lab, which will include a greenhouse, a prairie production and seed cleaning area, a classroom, an indoor archery range, public restrooms and a public use area for canoes, kayaks, paddleboards, skis and snowshoes.