According to A Brief History of the Village of Nassau, the Rensselaer County Agricultural and Liberal Arts Society operated the annual Nassau Fair from 1892 to 1944. Rensselaerites could get to Nassau, NY on the Albany and Hudson Electric Railroad to see the Fair.
Nassau Fair Exhibition Hall and the Parade of Carriages. Postcards from 1900 at the Nassau Free Library, for educational use only. They have ten other great postcards from the Nassau Fair, including decorated bicycles and carriages - check them out.
PREPARING FOR THE BIG NASSAU FAIR
DAILY PROGRAM HAS BEEN ARRANGED AND A FINE TIME IS ASSURED
Exhibits in all Departments Will Be Larger Than Ever - Success of the Fair is Already Certain and a Fine Time for all is Promised.
The ever popular Nassau fair will be held this year Sept. 14, 15, 16, 17. ... The management is offering $1,500 [?] in race purses and $7,000 in otherpremiums, and is making every possible effort to secure the best in attractions and exhibits, especially in the Floral and Poultry departments, whose list contain entries of well known exhibitors with high class exhibits.
The Poultry entry list is especially heavy, containing the names of well known outside, and local breeders, and chicken fanciers will be well paid in journeying to Nassau and witnessing the extra large exhibit of this year.
The Exhibition Hall with its fancy, domestic, educational and artistic displays, promises a treat, and the cattle and farm produce stalls this year will be filled by the old regulars; and many new ones have been recorded.
At this early date the space on the Midway has been taken so fast that if the applicants continue a double Midway will have to be staked out...
The horse races which is always a big feature should this year bring forth some of the best brushing ever witnessed on the Nassau track....
The fairgrounds offer every accommodation for rigs and autos. For the visitors there is a half hourly schedule on the A. and H. road to and from Albany and Rensselaer.
"Brushing" seems to refer to informal or amateur exhibition races, often with high stakes (see New York Times, July 13, 1997: A Roadway Built for the Elite to Trot Out Their Rigs).
The Nassau Fair Association lost a "brush" with the law a few years later, when a state audit determined that a great deal of prize money was misappropriated. New York Times, Jan. 9, 1915:
FIND FRAUD IN GIFTS OF STATE BOUNTY
Controller Charges That State Was Swindled in Agricultural Fair Awards - ASSEMBLYMAN IS INVOLVED
Day Laborers Confess That They Unwittingly Posed as Prize Winners for Mythical Exhibits.
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