With the ramping up of the vaccine program, August 2021 was looking good but the world had other ideas. Vaccine infection rates didn’t fall fast enough and the vaccine rollout was inhibited by a serum shortage, forcing a second cancellation until 2022.
Accepting their offer to add the Fair to Rideau Carleton’s beavy of events and activities the Gloucester Agricultural Society setup the first Fair in South Gloucester, roughly where the Hard Rock Casino stands today.
On June 9th, 1999, Fair President Dave Presley invited Rideau Carleton’s Warren Armstrong to cut the first opening ribbon at the Fair’s Opening Ceremonies.
And now the real work began…
While still in it’s early years and to reflect Gloucester’s diverse rural community, Doug Woodburn of Woodburn Farms was invited to bring an agricultural perspective to the volunteer Board. The Fair subsequently introduced farm animal displays, cattle breed line show competitions and a barnyard petting zoo, a sanctioned buck and doe rabbit show and a sanctioned goat show.
To celebrate the rapidly expanding City of Gloucester and the desire to provide local entertainment, Reeve Bob MacQuarrie tasked the Township’s Department of Parks and Recreation to create the Gloucester Fair.
Under Fair President Lyn Presley, the Fair was granted Ontario Agricultural status by Minister of Agriculture, Dennis Timbrell on November 27, 1984, creating the Gloucester Agricultural Society now official producers of the Gloucester Fair.
In a significantly less serious vien, Doo Doo the International Clown and his catchphrase “unbelievable”, appeared at the Fair for the first time and it began a 25+ year love af-fair (see what we did there?!). Children that experienced Doo Doo’s first years at our fair are now bringing their children to share a fond childhood memory.
…and Doo Doo will be here to greet them.
UNBELIEVABLE!
2020 was to be a transformative year but an unpredictable, unprecedented pandemic gripped the world, forcing the Fair to postpone operations until 2021.
We remained optimistic about our pending breakout future and hoped you could join us.
At a special Fair Board meeting on Monday, April 14th, 2014 the Capital Fair officially replaced the Gloucester Fair in both name and dates. Since 1975, the 4-day May fair had featured a popular Midway, extreme motorsport shows, horse shows, free live entertainment, an amazing kids area, great fair food vendors and diversions of all kinds. In taking on a new 10 day format in August, the fair moved to introduce an expanded program to the region by implementing an introductory free gate admission program.
The Kids BIG Tent was introduced along with the Agricultural Pavilion featuring farm displays, Doo Doo and his Dance Party, the Ultimutt Stunt Dog show, daily free LIVE entertainment, a Demolition Derby, a Petting Zoo, Pony Rides, the Birds of Prey show, the Community Stage, and more…
Partnering with Eastern Ontario’s largest midway, World’s Finest Shows brought all the fair favorites include the drop zone style ”Cannonball”, the ”Muzik Express”, the ”Pharaoh’s Fury” boat ride, the ”Scooter” bumper cars, the ”Fireball” and over 25 more.
Now that the Fair is drawing larger crowds to the fairgrounds, the City is also enjoying tremendous growth and the expansion at the Earl Armstrong site increases the pressure on the fair to consider another site. New facilities like the Splash Wave Pool and the pending development of the Ogilvie Road Library only hastened the search for a larger space.
As the Board of Directors really feels the pressure to relocate, the Fair is invited to the Rideau Carleton Raceway where key logistics exist and plenty of space abounds. And the Board agrees to go…
We applied for and were granted Ontario Agricultural status by the Minister of Agriculture, Dennis Timbrell on November 27, 1984, creating the Gloucester Fair.
The Fair successfully grew real community pride and recognizing all the excitement, the City made the decision to invite volunteers to take over what became “the Gloucester Festival of Friends”. The volunteers produced five solid years of fairs until it’s ever growing success propelled it forward to the next level…
