The Wisconsin State Fair returns to Wisconsin State Fair Park in West Allis for its 2018 run from August 2-12. Dreaming of cream puffs? Looking forward to that can't-miss concert? Interested in the visual arts events at the fair? The Shepherd Express' Wisconsin State Fair Guide has you covered! This special section is brought to you by the State Fair.
The 2018 Wisconsin State Fair will feature the usual program of diet-busting food, local art, livestock exhibitions, midway rides and musical acts that can still command an audience.
While Summerfest prides itself as the area’s premier summer festival, the Wisconsin State Fair regularly draws more attendees, offering a little something for almost everybody. Indeed, the long history of the State Fair has shown it to be an event that has adapted to the times while still holding true to its roots and the idea that it can be a showcase for best the state has to offer.
The very first Wisconsin State Fair was held in 1851, just three years after statehood was granted. The event was held over two days in a six-acre prairie along the banks of the Rock River in Janesville. 15,000 people attended the 1851 fair, which featured livestock exhibits, an oxen-drive plow contest, and a small midway. It was, at the time, the largest gathering of people in state history. For the next four decades, the fair would be a traveling event, setting up in various locations around the state and focusing on carnival attractions and livestock shows.
The fair was also a place where aspiring politicians could attempt to court voters. In 1859, presidential hopeful Abraham Lincoln spoke at the fair, which was being held in Milwaukee near the present-day campus of Marquette University. Newspapers panned his speech, but noted that he took time afterwards to tour the grounds. He took particular interest in a pint-sized strongman performing on the midway. Lincoln tried to lift the weights the man had been hoisting, but couldn’t budge the load. “Well, I can do something you can’t,” the future president told the little man. “I can lick salt off the top of your head.”
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The fair was not held between 1861 and 1863 due to the Civil War, but many of the most prominent visitors to the fair in the years to come were propelled to fame and power by the conflict. General William Tecumseh Sherman was the featured speaker in 1865, just months after the end of the war. Lt. Gen. Phil Sheridan spoke in 1869. Rutherford B. Hayes visited the fair in 1878, the only sitting president to attend, and former president Ulysses S. Grant spoke at the fair in 1880.
In 1892, the popularity of the fair led the state to allocate funds for a permanent fairgrounds to host the event. Always having done its best business in Milwaukee, a 160-acre site just to the west of the city—a former Native American village—was designated as State Fair Park. An automobile racetrack was added in 1903 and, in 1904, electric lighting allowed for the fair to extend into the evenings for the first time ever. During this era, the fair was regarded as one of the finest in the nation and had transformed from a country gathering into an exhibition that focused on showcasing new methods of food production and educating the public on proper nutrition and hygiene.
The new century also brought a new focus on food and fun. The first cream puffs were served at the fair in 1924 and quickly became the event’s prime culinary attraction. Today, attendees eat as many as 400,000 of them each year. At the new venue, musical entertainment also became a major part of the fair’s programming. The Modernistic Ballroom on the fairgrounds drew thousands for big band dance shows in the 1930s and ‘40s and movie and radio stars headlined shows. In the post-war years, stars of the new medium of television broadened the fair’s entertainment scope and young people abandoned the big band shows for rock and roll acts.
In the early 1970s, millions of dollars in upgrades at the fairground replaced many of the original facilities and brought the State Fair into its modern age. Long removed from its days as a prairie gathering, the State Fair has changed with the times, but remains a place where Wisconsinites gather and enjoy the best of what the state has to offer.
Read more of our coverage of the Wisconsin State Fair and enter to win a 4-pack of tickets here.
