DC State Fair (and Barracks Row Fall Festival), Saturday Sept. 22nd

DC being almost fully urbanized doesn't have much in the way of agriculture extension programs, despite there being such a program at the University of the District of Columbia, which is also recognized as an urban land grant university.

One of the great community building events of old is the county fair, complemented by State fairs as well.  In this region, Montgomery County, Prince George's County, Arlington County, and others all have annual county fairs.

Typically, the fairs show off agriculture and other "home" arts such as photography. 

Fortunately, while the MoCo Ag Fair is located in Gaithersburg, it's reachable by transit--subway to Shady Grove and a RideOn bus up Route 355.  You can see farm animals, award winning fruits and vegetables, displays, entertainment, and check out booths from for profit vendors and nonprofit organizations and government agencies--for example the Montgomery County recycling unit is always out in force and willing to give you stuff to assist your home composting efforts, etc.

For example this year I picked up an anti-plastic bag tax bag at the booth of the Montgomery County Republicans.  Note that the world didn't come to an end for Montgomery County residents who began to either pay for shopping bags or brought their own.

Left: county government booths at the Arlington County Fair, 2006.

Arlington, an "urban" county, uses the opportunity to showcase the various government agencies in a single row of the multiple-row exposition hall.  When I went a few years ago, one of the people manning the County Manager booth was actually the County Manager (then it was Ron Carlee) and we had a good conversation about various issues and I learned a lot.


DC's own State Fair

DC lacks an equivalent event--although we have some good street festivals, more about that later-- and so a group of citizens created a nonprofit group to put on the DC State Fair.

This year it will be at Barracks Row Festival, which is on 8th Street SE on Capitol Hill (accessible from the Eastern Market Metro Station), from 11am to 5pm.

Right: corn being grown in the front yard of a house on New Hampshire Avenue NW in the Petworth neighborhood.

Because it is at the end of the growing season, we won't be able to check out much in the way of crop winners, although preserved foods will be a big component of the event.