99 Years of The Fayette County Fair

This photo is undated but considering the car on the far right, it’s bound to be from the first years of the fair. The people on the right are in the grandstand for the horseraces. This photo is on loan to The Fayette Heritage Archives as part of our current Hermes Family exhibit. It’s sort of a homemade panorama. You can see that a couple of photos are pieced together and glued on matboard. 

“The biggest fair in South Texas” proclaims the cover of the program of the Second Annual Fayette County Fair in La Grange September 30, October 1-2-3. 1925. The booklet with an illustrated and colorful cover features advertisements and information on the schedule and events of the second annual Fayette County Fair held September 30 through October 3, 1925. Pleasure Trail carnival, Bimbo’s comedians, Gordon and DeHaven aerialists, and Morok Sisters acrobats provided entertainment. Cornelson’s Happy Seven provided dance music and the Fehnova Sisters performed Europe’s’ latest dance creations. Football games were played on two days. Premiums were paid on winning entries in the agriculture, baby, cattle, bees and honey, canning, floral, livestock, ladies, pastry, pecan, poultry, school, sheep and goats, and swine divisions. Horse Races were held each day and the overall purse was $2300. 

This week marks the 99th edition of The Fayette County Fair, a beloved local tradition that began more than 100 years ago. Thanks to Rox Ann Johnson at the Fayette Heritage Museum and Archives, we’ve learned a lot of surprising history of the fair.

The first Fayette County Fair was actually held in 1924. The Fayette Heritage Museum and Archives has some original stock certificates and a partially bug-damaged catalog from that first fair to prove it.

The eighteenth fair was held in 1941, but the nineteenth fair was not held until 1946 – a four year lapse because of World War II. The Fair Association held other activities in those years in between, but there was no big annual county fair.

That first fair was held October 22-25, 1924 in La Grange. The H.B. Poole Carnival Show had three riding devices; the whip, Ferris wheel and hobby horses. Premiums were paid on winning entries in the cattle, swine, sheep, poultry, farm products, pantry, floral and ladies home made divisions. Horse Races were held each day and the overall purse was $1,800.

At some point the fair was moved from October to Labor Day Weekend, but it continued annually even during a couple of years when it easily could have been cancelled.

Hurricane Harvey struck La Grange in August of 2017, just days before the fair, damaging and flooding hundreds of homes. The fair still occurred with all profits being donated to flood victims. The parade and the carnival were cancelled but the lots of folks attended the concerts by Kevin Fowler and Clay Walker.

Then in 2020, in the midst of the Covid Pandemic, the fair went on in an abbreviated format with the Queen’s Contest, barbecue cook-off and livestock judging continuing as planned but most other activities cancelled.

We hope you enjoy seeing some of these images from fairs past, and we hope to do something grand next year to celebrate the 100th Fayette County Fair. – Jeff Wick

This is an undated Houston Post news clipping from the early years of the Fayette County Fair. It includes photographs of horses lined up ready to race in front of the grandstands, County Judge Theodore W. Lueders, and people lined up in front of a crude tent with early automobiles in the background. The article describes the horse races, cotton returns, public projects for La Grange, and general prosperity, history of the area and description of the fair grounds, and ends with a description of the new bridge on South Jefferson Street.