Noble County Oklahoma Free Fair Festival
September in Perry belongs to a fair that publishes its own rulebook. The Noble County Oklahoma Free Fair Festival is the fall fair of Noble County, Oklahoma, staged at the Noble County Fairgrounds in Perry, the town an Oklahoma Historical Society encyclopedia entry names as the county seat. Its printed books for 2025 and 2026 lay out officers, schedules, premiums and rules — and discipline what can honestly be claimed, since building names shift between editions and covers promise wider spans than schedules deliver.
About the Fair Perry Publishes for Itself
The fair’s own books call it the Noble County Free Fair, the 2025 volume billed as the 97th Annual and the 2026 volume as the 98th Annual. The OSU Extension office for Noble County words it differently: its fairs page heads its section Fall Free Fair and speaks of the Noble County Fall Free Fair, while its fairgrounds description mentions a Noble County Fall Fair. The forms are kept apart here.
The officer-list heading in both books reads Noble County Free Fair Association Board of Directors; under it, the 2026 book names Terry Harmon as president, Jeanie Ivy as vice-president, Mary Deken as treasurer and Jerry Cottom as secretary, with Travis Potter, Madison Bolay, Arleta Pulliam, Shelby Murphy and Cody Sullins also named, and the 2025 book prints the same names in the same offices — each roster fenced to its own book. A mission statement in both books speaks instead of the Noble County Fair Board, also the Extension page’s board-table form, adding Joe Williams, Fairgrounds Supervisor. Liability wording names a Noble County Free Fair Board and livestock sections a Noble County Free Fair Association — further forms, unmerged. Both books also print a county commissioners list, a county body rather than the fair’s management. Extension staff lists likewise stand fenced to their books: Chad Webb, Lindsey Ball and Melanie Johnson in 2026, with the 4-H educator line vacant there but filled by Sarah Robertson in 2025.
Quick Facts
| Detail | What the record shows |
| Fair | The Noble County Free Fair, as its own books title it |
| County seat | Perry, as the Oklahoma Historical Society encyclopedia states |
| Grounds | Noble County Fairgrounds, Perry |
| Season | September |
| 2025 edition | Billed the 97th Annual; cover span September 6 to 12, 2025 |
| 2026 edition | Billed the 98th Annual; cover span September 12 to 18, 2026 |
| Viewing exhibits | Both books state there is no charge for admission to view the exhibits |
| Camping | No camping, RV or hookup terms appear in either book or on the Extension page |
Two Annual Billings and No Birthday
Nothing in either book, and nothing on the Extension page, says when this fair began. The 97th Annual billing of 2025 and the 98th Annual billing of 2026 are billing and nothing more; counting backwards from them to manufacture a first fair would be arithmetic dressed up as history. One older scrap proves longevity without proving an origin: a 1964 Oklahoma Today fair calendar listed a September Noble County Free Fair at Perry. The 2026 book’s dedication page honours Jerry Cottom — Fair Board secretary from 2003 and twenty-three years with Fall Fairs and Livestock Shows — a tribute to one man’s service, not a chronicle of the fair. Perry’s own past is older: laid out in 1893 as the seat when the Cherokee Outlet opened, in a county renamed for John Willock Noble. None of it dates the first fair.
What to Expect
The Week as the 2026 Book Lays It Out
The 2026 schedule opens on Saturday, September 12 with the horse show — check-in at 8:00, the show at 9:00 in the Fairgrounds Expo Building — and 4-H exhibits dropped off between 12:30 and 3:00. Monday, September 14 is the working hinge: The Venue takes entries from 8:00 until 6:00 in the evening, and the Farmhand Olympics run at 5:30. Tuesday, September 15 stacks the sheep and goat programme: Hearts and Hooves at 1:00, the Lamb Lead Interview and Show at 2:30, the Sheep Show at 3:00, the Fair Dedication and Bunny Scramble at 5:30, and the Goat Show at 6:30. Wednesday, September 16 judges poultry, pigeons and rabbits at 8:30 and closes with the Bucket Calf Show at 5:30 and the Beef Cattle Show at 6:00. Thursday, September 17 runs the Junior Farm Equipment Operator Contest at 9:00, the Fruit/Vegetable Sculpting and Arrangements Contest at 5:00 and the Swine Show at 6:00. Friday, September 18 is retrieval only, 10:00 until noon.
For a useful comparison, see the Muskogee County Oklahoma Azalea Festival for another county festival.
The Same Backbone, One Year Earlier
The 2025 book runs the same skeleton on its own days, and its differences are why the years must not be blended. Its horse show opened on Saturday, September 6, 2025, and entry day fell on Monday, September 8 — but in the Women’s Building, not The Venue. Tuesday put the Lamb Lead at 2:30, the Sheep Show at 3:00, the Fair Dedication and Bunny Scramble at 5:45 — a quarter of an hour later than 2026’s 5:30 — and the Goat Show at 6:30. Wednesday repeated the 5:30 Bucket Calf Show and the 6:00 Beef Cattle Show after morning poultry judging. Thursday held the equipment operator contest at 9:00, the sculpting contest at 4:00 rather than 2026’s 5:00, a Tiny Tot Review hosted by the Cherokee Strip Museum after the sculpting, and the Swine Show at 6:00. Friday, September 12 was pickup only.
Departments, Premiums and a Second Programme Layer
Across both books the divisions form the backbone: open livestock (breeding cattle, swine, sheep, goats, horse show), ag mechanics, poultry and rabbits, junior livestock through bucket calves, a 4-H division, and open exhibits from field crops to needlecraft and youth booths. Premium money is exhibitor money: in the 2026 book heifers pay twenty, eighteen, sixteen and fourteen dollars; breeding swine, sheep and goats and horse show classes pay fifteen, thirteen, eleven and nine; ag mechanics pays fifty down to five dollars for large exhibits, thirty-five down to two for medium and twenty down to two for small; the equipment operator contest pays forty down through ten dollars; indoor classes pay five, four, three and two; plants and flowers pay five, four and three; hay pays sixteen, fourteen, twelve and ten; each youth booth display receives twenty dollars and each special needs display five. A second programme layer sits on the Extension page for 2026 alone: it names judges — Royce Goodman, horses; Clay Brillhart, sheep and goats; Kenny Leatherwood, ag mechanics; Ty Drach, cattle; Hagen Puentes, swine — and adds poultry testing on Saturday, September 12, plus a Tractor Contest and a 5:00 Expo Arena Talent Show on Thursday, September 17 — Extension items only.
Planning Your Visit
Covers Promise More Days Than Schedules Deliver
Read any year’s cover and schedule as two documents. The 2025 cover announces September 6 to 12, yet its schedule holds no Sunday, September 7 and gives Friday, September 12 to exhibit pickup, 10:00 to noon. The 2026 cover announces September 12 to 18, while its schedule again skips Sunday, September 13 and ends on a pickup-only Friday. The Extension page dates the 2026 fair September 12 to 17 — its span stops where the show days stop, and the gap is precisely the book’s Friday retrieval morning. The 2025 book’s save-the-date for 2026 matched the 2026 cover; the 2026 book’s look ahead to September 11 to 17, 2027 is an announcement only.
What Viewing Costs, and What Entering Costs
On admission the two books speak with one voice and a narrow scope. Both print the sentence: there is no charge for admission to view the exhibits. That wording is the whole published admission position: exhibits only, those two books only, never rested on the word Free in the name. The same books show why it cannot be stretched: exhibitors work under a seventy-five dollar protest fee in both books’ general rules, and entering an alfalfa hay exhibit in 2026 carried a ten dollar fee per exhibit, paying for testing. An Extension poultry-testing layer’s free-entry wording is likewise exhibitor language, not a gate policy. No other visitor price appears in the record; fund descriptions are county finance and rental pricing is facility rental.
Two Addresses, Neither of Them From the Books
Neither book prints a street address for the grounds. The Extension page’s fairground contact gives Joe Williams, Fairgrounds Supervisor, at 1 Ivanhoe, Perry, OK 73077, printed without any street suffix; a places listing instead gives the fairgrounds at 1 Ivanhoe St, Perry, OK, and the two forms stand unreconciled. The Extension Office inside the Noble County Courthouse, mentioned in the 2026 book’s booths section, is an office location, never the fairgrounds. Camping is likewise undocumented: no camping, RV or hookup term appears for these grounds, and the books’ only camp wording is Camp Fire USA, a youth organisation’s name.
One Full Thursday, Following the 2026 Book
Thursday, September 17, 2026 is the densest day the 2026 book offers. Begin at 9:00 with the Junior Farm Equipment Operator Contest, then watch swine unloaded between 1:00 and 4:00. At 5:00 the record splits into layers: the book puts the sculpting contest then, while the Extension page separately lists a Talent Show at 5:00 in the Expo Arena and a Tractor Contest that Thursday. Stay to 6:00 for the Swine Show, the week’s final livestock judging in the book.
Perry’s Book Fair Against the Other Noble County Fairs
Two other Noble counties run confusingly similar fairs. Ohio’s fair at Caldwell, run by an agricultural society, publishes a booklet whose cover wording mirrors the Oklahoma books, its programme leaning on a midway, demolition derby and harness racing. Indiana’s community fair at Kendallville adds harness racing, draft horse pulls, a parade and a queen pageant, and publishes camping pages for its grounds. None of it belongs to Perry: neither Oklahoma book contains a carnival, midway, rodeo, concert, demolition derby, harness race or pageant, and borrowing Indiana’s camping pages to fill Perry’s silence would invent a service. Closer to home, the Extension page says this fair takes place in conjunction with Perry’s Cherokee Strip Celebration — a statement about timing, not a merger: the celebration’s parade and town programme remain the town’s, and the only celebration-linked item inside a fair book is the museum-hosted Tiny Tot Review of 2025. The February Noble County Jr. Expo at the same grounds is likewise a separate event.
Before You Drive to Perry
- Check which span you are reading — cover, schedule or Extension page.
- Plan show days from the Saturday horse show to the Thursday swine show; treat Friday as pickup only.
- Leave Sunday out of the plan; neither book schedules anything on it.
- Expect show rings and exhibit halls, not a midway; no rides appear in either book.
- Exhibitors: note the ten dollar alfalfa fee of 2026 and the seventy-five dollar protest fee in both books.
- Navigate by both published address forms; the Extension and places layers differ.
- Do not count on staying overnight; no camping terms are published.
Beyond the Fairgrounds
Perry rewards a slower look once the show rings empty. Laid out in 1893 at the opening of the Cherokee Outlet, as seat of a county just renamed for John Willock Noble, the town still gathers around that role: its courthouse holds the Extension office the fair books mention, and the Cherokee Strip Museum enters the fair’s own record through the Tiny Tot Review it hosted in the 2025 schedule. Each September the town keeps its own Cherokee Strip Celebration — separate from the fair, alongside it. Billings, Morrison and Red Rock appear throughout the books as home communities of chapters and exhibitors.
Why Two Printed Books Matter to a Small County Fair
A fair that prints a full book promises officers who can be named, premiums published and rules that can be argued with. For Noble County, that paperwork turns one September week into an annual audit of the county’s farm work, when a summer of feeding, fitting, sewing and growing is ranked in public. The premiums are modest — five dollars here, twenty there — yet they convert private effort into public standing. The no-charge exhibits sentence, repeated in both books, states the fair’s side of the bargain: the results stand open to anyone who walks in. Even the shift from Women’s Building to The Venue records a fairgrounds changing while keeping its September appointment.
Frequently Asked Questions
Is Perry really both the county seat and the fair’s home?
Yes, on separate evidence. The Historical Society encyclopedia’s Noble County entry states plainly that Perry is the county seat, while the fair’s own books and the Extension page place the fair at the Noble County Fairgrounds in Perry. Billings, Morrison and Red Rock appear only as communities whose chapters and exhibitors take part.
What does it cost to walk in and look at the exhibits?
Both books print the same sentence: there is no charge for admission to view the exhibits. That is the whole published position, while the same books charge exhibitors a seventy-five dollar protest fee and, in 2026, a ten dollar alfalfa testing entry fee. No other visitor price appears in the record.
The covers and the schedules disagree. Which dates should a visitor trust?
Trust the schedule for what happens and the cover only for the outer frame. In 2025 the cover ran September 6 to 12, but the last show day was Thursday, September 11, Friday was pickup only and no Sunday programme existed; 2026 repeated the pattern across September 12 to 18, ending with Thursday, September 17.
Can we stay overnight at the fairgrounds in an RV?
Neither book, and no Extension page, offers camping, RV parking or hookups at the fairgrounds. The word camp surfaces once, inside the name Camp Fire USA — an organisation’s name, not an invitation to pitch anything.
What to Expect From the Next Noble County Oklahoma Free Fair Festival
How often is Noble County Oklahoma Free Fair Festival held?
The documented pattern is annual and September-bound: books cover a 2025 edition billed 97th Annual and a 2026 edition billed 98th Annual, and a magazine fair calendar places the same fair in a September as far back as 1964. No founding year stands behind those billings.
When is the next Noble County Oklahoma Free Fair Festival?
The 2026 book fixes September 11 to 17, 2027 in a save-the-date. An announcement, not a documented edition: nothing about 2027 — buildings, times or programme — has yet been published in this record.
Will the dates change?
They already vary within a single year: cover, schedule and Extension spans gave three slightly different frames for 2026. Expect any announced span to be refined by its own year’s book schedule.
Trust the schedules and question the covers: what Perry’s books promise — a September week of judged work at the county seat, exhibits open to any viewer — they document in full, and what they leave unsaid they leave unsaid honestly.
