FAIRBURY - Fairbury and Jefferson County have a lot to offer to tourists: historic sites such as Rock Creek Station and the Rock Island Depot, friendly communities and summer events such as the Diller Picnic.

The difficult part is getting the word out about the great things the community has to offer.

However, that will soon change when a tourism video featuring the towns of Fairbury and Diller and the rest of Jefferson County is completed and shown on cable television across the state, and could possibly be shown at tourism kiosks. In Fairbury, it will be shown on Time Warner channel 10.

“It’s to showcase Fairbury and Jefferson County as great places to visit or to move to,” said Danni Starck, marketing director at Diode Communications, a member of the Diller Community Club and former president of the Fairbury Chamber of Commerce. “It’s promoting Nebraska areas to Nebraska residents.”

The project is a joint venture of the city of Fairbury, the village of Diller, the Diller Community Club and several other community groups and businesses, each kicking in a portion of the cost of the video production.

There will actually be two versions �“ one focusing on Fairbury and Jefferson County and another featuring several area counties in the region, said Jim Ferneau, Fairbury city administrator.

Contributing to the video project were the city of Fairbury, the Jefferson County Visitor Committee, Diller Community Club, Diller Community Foundation, Wal-Mart through the Diller Community Foundation, Diller Picnic Committee, the Fairbury Journal-News, Fairbury Foods, Stagecoach Mall and Fairbury Executive Suites.

“It’s in support of tourism,” Ferneau said. “Also, when we look at tourism advertising out of the area there’s a potential for new residents as well.”

A separate committee is in charge of selecting content for the video. The chair of the committee is Charles Schmidt. Other communities in Jefferson County were invited to take part but no others stepped forward.

Starck said it will be a 30-minute video featuring five components �“ history, tourism, quality of life, economic development and event festivals.

The video is being produced by Doug Johnson Audio & Video Productions in Sioux City, Iowa, which specializes in tourism videos, although the company has done wedding videos and short documentaries.

The Jefferson County video is one of about 40 communities in eight regions to undertake the video, Ferneau said. South Sioux City was the first to do a tourism video, and the concept was promoted to other cities across Nebraska, he said.

“There was a larger response for them than anticipated,” he said. “It’s good for us that there are more of them out there,” he added, noting seeing the same video on a community would work against the project. “Having us in the mix is a very valuable tool,” he said.

Locally, the committee wanted to concentrate on the entire county. The video will feature some of the historical spots around the county, including Steele City’s living history and the state lakes near Alexandria.

“If it’s a tourist attraction, we don’t want to leave anything out,” Starck said, but it’s more than that. “It’s not just tourist attractions, it includes some businesses.”

Starck said the majority of the video will be focused on Fairbury, since they are covering most of the cost. Fairbury attractions such as parks, the golf course, schools, the wellness center and other quality of life issues will be covered.

Some of the other featured attractions include the Rock Island Depot, the orphanage, the Opera House, Fairbury Fest (which is now Wild West Weekend), the Diller Picnic, the tractor pull, the softball tournament, Jefferson County Speedway, Fairbury businesses, and for Diller, Lottman-Carpenter and Diode Communications.

The video is expected to be completed in the next couple of months, Starck said. They are at the stage of nearly being able to see the preliminary video and reviewing the written script.

One glitch has been filling the entire 30-minute time allotted for the video. To fill the time, Starck said, they are bringing in seniors who are 80 or older to give their memories of the earlier days in the community, including memories of when the Rock Island Depot was operating and when there used to be a circus in Fairbury.

“We’re trying to get copies of the interviews for the families,” she said.

Some copies of the video will be given to the city of Fairbury and the Fairbury Chamber of Commerce to send to businesses who are thinking of relocating to the area as well as to local businesses as a human resources recruiting tool.

“Businesses can pull a three- to five-minute segment to use to market their companies in the area,” Ferneau said. They can send out DVDs to potential employees to show them the community is somewhere they might want to relocate.

“It’s really designed to get at the heritage of our area, where we came from and where we’re going,” Ferneau said.