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300 Years Of New Hampshire Fairs

PHOTO: A photo from the Cheshire County Agricultural Fair Oxen Competition in the late 1800s.

by Robert Hanaford Smith, Sr.
Weirs Times Contributing Writer

Among the claims that the State of New Hampshire can confidently make is that of having the first agricultural fair in the nation. That event happened 300 years ago and we can thank the Scotch-Irish farmers who had settled in a place they called Nutfield but was soon renamed and chartered Londonderry.
Having their roots in Scotland these farmers were Presbyterian, not Roman Catholic as some seemingly assumed upon their arrival. If you research the oldest fair in New Hampshire you are apt to find a more recent one listed as the oldest in the State because, though being the first, the Londonderry Fair, was discontinued in 1850 by the New Hampshire legislature because things had got out of hand, so to speak. Also, New Hampshire was not a State, but a Province, when the first fairs began.

Pittsfield, Massachusetts is sometimes proclaimed to be the host of the first fair in the nation and the fair’s founder, Elkanah Watson acclaimed as the father of the country’s agricultural fairs. That fair, which at first consisted only in the displaying and shearing of sheep, was held in 1814. Elsewhere you will find that the first State Fair in the United States was held in Syracuse, New York in the year 1841.
County fairs preceded State Fairs, however, with the state ones being sponsored by the state in which they were held. The Londonderry agricultural event began much earlier, in the year 1722, which was in colonial days before the independence of the United States, perhaps explaining why these New Hampshire fairs are not credited with being the first in the country.
Rev. Edward L. Parker, in his History of Londonderry, published in 1851, tells us of the first fairs in that town “for which,” he says, “the town became distinguished.” The ten-mile square town was chartered by George the Third of England and the new proprietors were instructed to perform certain duties.
The charter stated, “that on every Wednesday in the week forever, they may hold, keep, and enjoy a market for the buying and selling of goods, wares, and merchandise, and various kinds of creatures, endowed with the usual privileges, profits, and immunities as other market towns fully hold, possess, and enjoy, and two Fairs annually, forever; the first to be held and kept within the said town the eighth day of November next, and so annually, forever; the other on the eighth day of May, in like manner. Provided, it should so happen, that at any time either of these days fall on the Lord’s Day, then the said Fair shall be held and kept the day following it.”

Leon Anderson, the legislative historian prepared a sketch on the history of New Hampshire Fairs Association in the year 1970. In it he wrote that major attractions at the fair were human and horse races and wrestling. It seems true to this day that agricultural fairs cannot continually attract crowds of people unless contests and entertainment are included in the offerings. Anderson said, “This festival finally assumed such scandalous and mulcting dimensions, despite repeated warnings, that the 1850 legislature repealed the 1722 authority and voted it out of existence. And so this first fair in American history went into ignoble oblivion.”
Rev. Parker indicated, however, that for some years the Londonderry Fairs were “conducted with order and propriety,” the design was good, and “was of public use and convenience.” People from adjoining towns would come to take advantage of the Londonderry markets and fairs, with merchants coming from Haverhill and Salem, and, even Boston.
The Fairs in Londonderry didn’t last forever as the charter specified. According to Rev. Parker “…the Fair became of little or no use, was soon perverted from its original design, and for many years proved a moral nuisance, attracting chiefly the more corrupt portion of the community, and exhibiting for excessive days, each year, scenes of vice and folly in their worst forms.”
The town had difficulty in regulating the Fair, and, at their 1798 Town Meeting voted to limit the length of the event to two days a year, one on May 19th and one on October 19th if those days didn’t occur on the Sabbath. In 1839 the only tavern in the village, where the Fair had been held, stopped serving alcoholic beverages in keeping with the temperance movement, and people stopped coming to the Fair. The legislature shut down the Londonderry Fairs for good in the year 1850.
The State of New Hampshire began giving financial support to encourage the organization of fairs by the county societies and established a State Board of Agriculture in 1820, but the Board and the fairs were short-lived. Maybe because of what happened with the Londonderry Fair public opinion in New Hampshire turned against approval of the fair and the Legislature refused for years to provide money as an incentive to hold the events.

In 1849 the New Hampshire State Agricultural Society was begun without State funds. This society sponsored fairs that were put up for bids by New Hampshire communities that could provide acceptable horse racing facilities. Fairs were held in Concord, Manchester, and Tilton in those days.
Apparently the Board of Agriculture was inactive for about a decade until a second Board was organized in 1870, but this board started out with an anti-fair attitude feeling that should be more beneficial in educating farmers with less emphasis on the horse racing. Though almost 100 years ago, perhaps 1928 was the beginning of the modern day Fair when the New Hampshire Fair Association was started by Commissioner of Agriculture Andrew L, Felker. Officers were Dr. Guy Chesley of Rochester, President; Lewis Nelson of Hopkinton, Vice-President; and Dr. Robinson W. Smith of Laconia, Secretary-Treasurer.
In 1939 the State Legislature was subsidizing eight fairs with $3,500 and the fairs were paying out more than $500 each in premiums according to Mr. Anderson. The Fairs at that time were Lancaster, Canaan, Sandwich, Plymouth, Cheshire (Keene), Deerfield, and Rochester. Most of these are still operating.

In his 1970 history of New Hampshire Fairs, Leon Anderson credits Senator Lester Mitchell with giving new life to New Hampshire Fairs. Mitchell held the swing voice to continuing the Rockingham race track gambling franchise and agreed to vote in favor of that if the race track would agree to give the fairs “one-quarter of one percent of its pari mutuel wagers.
Things have changed since then; however, fair organizers should take heed to the lessons offered by the fair of 300 years ago that didn’t last “forever.”