Pennsylvania State Farm Show Complex

The Pennsylvania State Farm Show Complex was erected as a sprawling twenty-four-acre under-one-roof home for what became North America’s largest indoor agricultural event, the Pennsylvania State Farm Show. Pennsylvania’s first statewide agricultural exhibition was held in Harrisburg in 1851 at the county fairgrounds in Uptown Harrisburg, and annual events were then held in various Pennsylvania cities until the end of the 19th century. The groundwork for a permanent farm show began in 1876 with the establishment of the State Board of Agriculture, which was required to meet once a year in January and once a year in Harrisburg. In 1906, the Board joined the State Livestock Association and the Dairy Union to hold an exhibition of farm products that for the first time were judged with cash prizes awarded. By 1917, the first official Farm Show exhibition was organized and for the next thirteen years was held downtown at the Emerson-Brantingham Implement Company Building at 10th and Market Streets. The State Products Farm Show Commission was created in 1927, and the complex was initially developed in 1929 on a forty-acre cow pasture at North Cameron and Maclay Streets. Harrisburg architects Lawrie and Green designed the main exhibition hall, which opened in time for the 1931 show. In 1939, a large arena designed by Philadelphia architect Verus Ritter was built, and in 2003 expanded exposition space and a new main entrance were completed. The complex remains a statewide institution, hosting not only the annual farm show but also more than two hundred events and more than one million visitors each year for nationally and internationally recognized trade shows, sporting events, exhibitions, and performances.

Harrisburg, Pennsylvania · United States