Reminiscences of Children's Fair (Continued)
Construction of the Fair (Continued Page 15 - 16)
Records and Reminiscences of Children’s Fair
“Seeking to make idle hours useful hours, I have written it in my old age Please accept my old RECORDS AND REMINISCENCES.” - C. H. Obear - July 8, 1911
Construction of the Fair - Page 15-16
Here another perplexity comes up the day of the Fair. A neighbor to the Church (how many we have had!) sent over word that she would like to send over a less plain dinner than had been prescribed for 25 cents. What shall be done? All must be served alike. It is immediately decided by the general committee (all of whom are in and about the hall ready to get together for an emergency), that she may send in the hot dinner, and the seller of tickets may advertise that such a dinner has been sent in by Mrs. Bean for a named price.
A limited number, first applying, will find it at the upper end of the table. All parties are satisfied that we are all on an equality on Children's Fair Day.
I think, when speaking of this change in the manner of our taking refreshments, I forgot to state that these specifications of what constituted a "Plain dinner" was the following, copied from the book of the Secretary: Baked pudding and beans, brown and white bread, pies, tea and coffee, butter, pickles, etc., the latter, fifty years ago, meaning cucumber, generally. Do our modern cooks ever bring to the table the old-fashioned, brick oven, golden Indian pudding, surrounded in the dish by its own rich jelly? This was the kind that came to the Fair from Mrs. Aaron Bucknam, Mrs. Richard Davis, Mrs. Reuben Taylor, Mrs. Russell Farwell and others in the early times. The modern fashion of seeking great variety and studying cook books and receipts would make our young cooks of this generation "turn up their noses" at such a dinner, but no dissatisfaction clouded the faces of those who elbowed each other in good comradeship at the Plain dinner.
As I remember these harvest festivals as a social as well as a benevolent element in the life of the town, they were a blessing to ourselves as well as to the recipients of our bounty. For one day in the year the citizens met without inequality. No distinction of birth, station, learning, riches or avocation; they were all laid aside.
154rd Children’s Fair - August 15, 2015
James Roger diary entry
19th July 1913
Thunder shower during night; fair and warm day. David cut hay for Corbett in forenoon and went to Greenville in afternoon. Got Pete shod and paid Farrar’s account for funeral services ($64). Bought frying pan, Vaseline, and quinine. I picked 2 fowls and 3 broilers. Took potatoes to Lowes and delivered fowls and broilers.
Upcoming Event
163rd Children’s Fair - August 17, 2024
New Ipswich Congregational Church
150 Main Street, New Ipswich, NH
10 AM - 3 PM
“Frying pan, Vaseline, and quinine.”
Interesting aspects of the Fair from days gone by. I think it's less complicated today. Like James, a third of my hay is cut and will be raked today and bailed tomorrow. I'm glad I don't have to catch boilers.