ST. MARY’S FAIR SEPT. 23, 24, 25, 26, 2021: The original agricultural fair retains identity and purpose with emphasis on farming; bring the family for learning, good food, tractor and horse pulls and endless exhibits

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St. Mary’s Fair News Over the Decades

Maryland Gov. Theodore McKeldin (R. elected in 1950 and 1954)

MCKELDIN TALKS AT FAIR

Crowns ‘Queen of Tolerance’ At Leonardtown

LEONARDTOWN, MD.  Sept. 21, 1956 – Governor McKeldin today attacked intellectual intolerance in America – “the theory that is wrong to even to think thoughts not approved by the majority.”

The Governor made his remarks while crowning the “Queen of Tolerance” at the opening of the three-day St. Mary’s County Fair. She is Miss Pat Napier, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Val Madsen, of Town Creek Manor.

“There is a certain irony if that the fact that after 300 years we are still celebrating the establishment here at St. Mary’s of the rule of reason in religious affairs,” McKeldin said.

Religious Tolerance Fixed

“I think we may fairly claim that religious tolerance is firmly and permanently fixed in the American way of life,” he said, but “it cannot be denied that (tolerance) has suffered losses in our political, our economic and strange to say, in our intellectual life.”

“It is the recent revival of intellectual intolerance that gives thoughtful Americans real reason to worry,” he said. “It is true that it is no new thing. We have always had people who were angered by the introduction of any new Idea.”

“But in the past the great strength of such movements has been supplied by the ignorant led…always by people who enjoyed neither the confidence nor the respect of Americans with much common sense.”

“Today we face a different situation,” McKeldin said. “Today we find me who are neither dullards, demagogues nor fanatics advocating measures that are definitely born of intellectual intolerance. We find me with a reputation for high intelligence suggesting that the control of opinion is not merely possible, but a legitimate function of the state.”

Not Partisan Politics

“This is not a matter of partisan politics,” he said. “If one party has its McCarthys, the other has its McCarran’s.”

Intellectual intolerance, the Governor said, accounted for “our more extreme security laws – since somewhat corrected by the Supreme Court – that barred citizens from Government employment even in positions that had nothing to do with the national security.”

“If Intolerance in the realm of the mind and spirit is ever accepted in this country,” McKeldin said, “then the old America will be definitely overthrown no matter what the Government may call itself.”

“The fight for freedom that was started here in the Seventeenth Century goes on in the Twentieth Century and will be continued until every form of tyranny over the minds of men shall be abolished from the earth,” he said.

St.-Marys-Fair-to-hold-25th-celebration-in-1971-Baltimore-Sun

St. Mary’s County Fair

The Baltimore Sun

Leonardtown, Md. June 2, 1947 – The St. Mary’s County Fair, scheduled for September 19 – 21 has been granted $2,000 for premiums and prizes, Heath Steele, secretary of the newly organized county fair board. He said the board of directors would issue stock at $10 per share.

HEATH MCCLUNG STEELE – arrived in St. Mary’s County in 1934 and purchased Glen Mary Farm in Park Hall and restored the farm.  Steele was a world-famous mining engineer and executive with American Metal. He died in 1956 of a heart attack at his residence in the Delmonico Hotel in New York City and is buried at Trinity Church in St. Mary’s City, Md.

Glen Mary Farm is an active and vibrant farm raising livestock in a healthy way.

“We achieve this through careful grazing and foraging management practices that mimic the natural rhythms that wild cattle, pigs, chickens, and turkeys thrived in for millennia before their domestication.”

Sutler Post Farm wagon is readied for the team of Clydesdales to be hitched up for the Fair Parade. THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY photos
The grooming has been completed and the time has come for a performance. Sutler Post Farm shows their Clydesdales. THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY photo
The 4-H livestock show at the St. Mary’s Fair packs in a huge audience. THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY photo
This meathouse was built in 1908 on the farm of Malcolm Morris in Callaway, Md. Photo courtesy of Malcolm Morris

FROM 1913

ST. MARY’S FAIR THIS WEEK

Agricultural Exhibition Will Open at Leonardtown Tuesday

THE BALTIMORE SUN

Leonardtown, Md.  (Oct. 26, 1913) – The St. Mary’s County Agricultural Fair, organized and conducted by Leonard Hall, the agricultural school here, will open Tuesday and continue for three days.

The latest methods of tillage by tractor engines are to be demonstrated. Harvesting of crops by improved methods will be exemplified and there is to be a display of farm engines and new model machinery in operation. The work is to be done as the farmer does it in his own fields. Forty acres of land are to be handled during the three days and all farmers will have the advantage of witnessing the benefits of science applied to sowing, harvesting, and caring for crops.

Model dairy barns and silos have been erected for the use of the school and these will be operated for the benefit of visitors. Students will test milk and the bacteriological class will give demonstrations.

From present indications, the cattle show will be the largest division. Four large barns have been taxed to their capacity to make room for the livestock and some exhibitors of horses must seek board for their exhibits in livery stables of the town. The field exhibits are pouring in and the kitchen goods department fills a good space.

The ladies are taking an active part in the conduct of the fair. They have assumed charge of the dining hall. The poultry section of the fair will be attractive. Many coops have been booked and some are already on the grounds. The school is putting in incubators and a brooder in connection with the new science hall.

The livestock auction was held by the 4-H packs in a crowd. THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY photo
Longhorn thinks about his performance coming up in the show ring. THE CHESAPEAKE TODAY photo
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