Washburn Valley Show

Over the last few months Chris and I, along with a small committee, have been working on an Exhibition all about The Washburn Valley Show, Butter Making, and sheep sales which used to be held at The Sun Inn and The Hopper Lane. The sales were big events attracting buyers from many miles away as well as locals.
The Washburn Valley Show ran from 1906 to 1973. It was started by a small group of local farmers, who called themselves The Washburn Valley Tenant Farmers Association who got together and in 5 weeks planned the first ever show. It was attended by 800 people which when you consider the means of transport that would be available in 1906 it was a considerable number.
The show moved around 6 sites in the locality and was a tremendously popular event. Sadly as with lots of things it ended in 1973 due to lack of funds.
For the exhibition we were loaned all kinds of memorabilia from car stickers, catalogues, scrap books full of press cuttings and even the original Minutes book. We have had a great time looking at all the nostalgia , its been really interesting.
All the items are on display for all to see every weekend during June and July so go along and have a cup of tea, or lunch and see our exhibition at the same time!.
As a thank you to all we held a preview day on Thursday and invited all those who had helped, or loaned things etc and during the afternoon we served tea and scones and in the evening the second part which involved wine and nibbles!!
It was a long day but really enjoyable, although I was glad to get my shoes off at the end of the evening!!