Are ya goin’ to the fair?
Most folks we know will be there.
There's Henry, Bob, and Uncle Lou,
with all the kids and ladies too.
Ya know the fellas in the band will play.
It's goin’ to be a mighty grand day
down at the Dighton Fair.
* * *
It was a special day with hundreds of people eager to see old friends and have some fun. Yet somehow the unknown photographer of this postcard managed to get everyone to stand still and look at his camera. He wrote a useful caption onto the negative that reads:
Fair. Dighton Sept 22
12
12
There are not many towns in America with that name. There is one in Massachusetts and another in Kansas, but it seems highly improbable that the Citizen's Band of McBain, Michigan, as painted on the band's bass drum, would travel so far for a town fair. Instead they went down the road to the crossroads of 19 Mile Road with 130th Avenue where the small community of Dighton put on an agricultural fair. It's about 14 miles from McBain, a city in north central Michigan with about 650 citizens now and 546 in 1910. The Dighton Store proudly posts on its building that it's been around "Since 1887."
In 1912, September 22 fell on a Sunday.
 |
| Dighton, Michigan |
In September 1909 the Dighton Fair got a brief mention
in the Grand Rapids newspaper.
in the Grand Rapids newspaper.
 |
| Grand Rapids MI Press 30 September 1909 |
The fruit exhibit had thirty-six different entries.
There were forty-two in the vegetable and grain department,
and fifty in the stock department.
Admission was free to all the exhibits and attractions.
There were forty-two in the vegetable and grain department,
and fifty in the stock department.
Admission was free to all the exhibits and attractions.
This is my contribution to Sepia Saturday
where this weekend it's Sepia Sunday.
where this weekend it's Sepia Sunday.
6 comments:
What a great photo of the whole group. Amazing, as you say, the photographer managed to get them all together like that for the shot. And it's always fun to see how you separate the subjects into smaller compartments for a closer look. :)
Modern computer technology is certainly very helpful for having a "closer look" at old photos and postcards! Great crowd picture!
Wonderful post. And yes, kudos to the photographer for getting what was probably most of the town to pose for a group photo. My first job as a teenager was at a county fair, and I still love going to state and local fairs when I can. There's just something about the smell of cut hay and the pride of entering fruits, vegetables and animals in competition.
A wonderful collection of vintage “crowd”photographs and people enjoying themselves. - great matches for the prompt.
I actually love to take photos of groups of people...to tell them to all look up and say some strange word like "sex" when they expected "cheese." That photographer must have had everyone's attention somehow, but not with smiles so much. I wish I had visited a real country fair...all the state fairs I've attended are just amusement parks to me, rides, noise, crowds.
That must have been the entire citizenry. I wonder who won the blue ribbons.
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