Published Thursday, August 8, 2002
Herald Staff Writer
What started out as a picnic in 1877 to commemorate Commodore Perry's Victory on Lake Erie is now a seven-day event in old-fashioned Mercer County fair tradition.
The Transfer Harvest Home Fair, now in its 125th year, used to be a one-day Harvest Home Picnic held in Frampton Grove near the present location of the Shenango Dam, and was also near the Erie and Pennsylvania Railroad tracks, according to historical information by Janet Espey, 81, of Collins Drive in Greenville.
"I've been involved forever," she said with a laugh, speaking of her 50-year involvement. "My dad was president (of the fair board) and my brother was president also. When your father's head honcho, the kids work."
Her father, Basil Morrison, was one of the people who came up with the picnic event; the first picnic was attended by 2,000 people, Mrs. Espey said.
Because of its location near railroad lines, people came to the picnic event from Pittsburgh and Erie using the trains, Mrs. Espey said.
She said the harvest picnic event used to be held on the Saturday before Labor day, with bands, political speakers, horseshoes, the sale of summer harvest and baked goods, and "a rival game of baseball with Transfer and Clarksville with much cheering crowds."
By 1945, the event moved to the Transfer Kiwanis-owned community park to accommodate its size, starting with vespers on Sunday night and ending with fireworks Saturday.
Mrs. Espey's nephew, Dan Morrison, who is the Transfer Harvest Home Association's vice president, also had a special memory of past fair events called Cash in the Sky during the 1960s.
"Janet's brother, Lester Morrison, (residing now at St. Paul Homes) was a pilot. On each night of the three-day fair, he would fly low over the fairgrounds and on each pass throw small six-inch paper plates out the window of the plane," Morrison said.
Morrison said the paper plates had pictures of different denominations of money stamped on them, possibly a free ride-a-rama pass, and that "kids would run like crazy as the plates floated everywhere.
"The interesting part came as parents hoisted their kids on top of rooftops, etc., to retrieve plates that landed there," said Morrison, adding the event stopped in the late 1960's when the Federal Aviation Administration banned low flights over highly populated areas.
Other interesting events include ATV quad racing, the Bandit band, Miracle Valley Praise Team and the Folk Singers of Notre Dame this evening; a pet parade, the Southbound 65 band and demolition derby Friday; and children and family games, a dog training show, mud drag racing and Bandit band Saturday.