Fairs have fared well since Ohio’s early days
The Delaware County Fair was back, and with it the Little Brown Jug harness race.
Its reemergence from cancellation in 2020 caused by the pandemic reminds one that Ohio is a place that really likes its fairs.
And there are a lot of them. From June to October, in a year without interruptions, one could attend no less than 87 county fairs across the state. In addition, there also are seven independent fairs still held in Ohio.
One of them is the Hartford Fair in Licking County and another is in Richwood in Union County.
The attraction of Ohioans to local fairs – with what one account calls “recurring celebrations of our products, people and accomplishments” – is nothing new. We have been celebrating for quite a while, and in doing so we follow in traditions that are quite old and virtually worldwide.
The word “fair” evolved from a Latin term “feriae,” meaning “days of holiday, rest and feasting.” And people have been gathering to rest and feast for many years prior to the emergence of the Roman empire. Religious holidays across much of the world traditionally have attracted entertainers and sellers of food, goods and services.
With the coming of the Middle Ages, many of these gatherings had been organized into a relatively regular schedule in western Europe centered on the major religious feast days. In more recent centuries some religious festivals remained, but many of the great fairs kept all of the display and entertainment but became more secular in presentation. All of this eventually arrived in America. In 1810, an enterprising resident of Berkshire, Massachusetts, established what is now recognized as the oldest local fair in America. It would take a few years, but Ohio would soon be looking to encourage fairs, as well.
Ohio became a state in 1803, but for much of its early history, the small number of early residents were occupied with literally carving out homesteads from the old-growth forests with trees 100 feet tall and the extensive prairies of shoulder-high grass. All the while, they were dodging occasional elk, moose or a passing panther.
In 1845, a number of Ohio farmers came together and formed an Ohio Board of Agriculture. In 1846, recognizing the fact that there were a lot of farmers in Ohio, the General Assembly created an Ohio State Board of Agriculture. The board set an initial goal of organizing county fairs in all of Ohio’s counties. To do this, the board established local county boards who could determine their needs and lobby state and local government for assistance with a local fair or other matters of agricultural interest.
While the counties were doing this, the state board moved on to try and establish a state fair, as well.
This proved to be a bit harder to do. Even with steamboats on the rivers and lakes and a canal and rudimentary road system in Ohio, travel across the state was still difficult. To encourage local attendance, the board decided that the state fair should be a moveable celebration. The fair would move from town to town across the state.
The state board established district fairs as a means to move to a state fair. Initial district fairs in Wilmington in 1847 and Xenia in 1848 led the board to
authorize a state fair for 1849.
That fair never took place: An outbreak of cholera across Ohio forced its cancellation.
Ohio’s first state fair was held at Camp Washington near Cincinnati in 1850. The fair was held in the fall with the idea that the risk of cholera would be lower.
Nevertheless, the superintendent of the grounds, one Darius Lapham, died of cholera a few weeks before opening day. Undeterred, the fair opened on schedule.
In 1851, the state fair came to the village of Franklinton, across the Scioto River to the west of Columbus, and was successful there, as well.
With these successes, the fair continued to move, returning to Columbus twice – once to Franklinton in 1855 and then to Schiller Park in 1864 and 1865.
Advances in railroad and open-road transportation led to the adoption of a single, central location for the fair. That location was in Columbus, and from 1874 to 1885 it was held in what is now Franklin Park.
But Columbus was growing, and it became apparent that the fair should move to the nearby countryside.
In 1886, the Ohio State Fair moved to its current location. Even as Columbus grew up and around the fairgrounds, the fair stayed in its new permanent home.
The Franklin County Fair was a little more mobile. Using the Franklin Park site for many years, the fair later moved to its current location in nearby Hilliard.
It joined many other county fairs in resuming full operation in 2021 after having to cope with the pandemic in 2020. The same was true for many of the other county fairs in Ohio.
Fairs have a long tradition in Ohio and are welcome in their return.
Local historian and author Ed Lentz writes the As It Were column for Thisweek Community News and The Columbus Dispatch.