Noble County Ohio Fair Festival
For six days at the turn of August into September, the Noble County Fairgrounds in Caldwell become the working centre of Ohio’s youngest county: harness horses on the track across the first two days, rough trucks and rodeo stock under the lights later in the week, show livestock in the barns, hall exhibits under judgement and a midway alongside all of it. The fair is run by The Noble County Agricultural Society and staged in the county seat village. This guide follows the record exactly as the Society and the state publish it.
A Society Fair in the County Seat
The event is styled the Noble County Fair on its own site, schedule page and fair book; its youth division appears in its own layers as the Noble County Jr. Fair, a division of the one fair and never a second event beside it. The organiser is named in the fair book’s constitution in full: this organization shall be known as The Noble County Agricultural Society. A county agricultural society corporation under Chapter 1711 of the Ohio Revised Code, the Society answers to its own members — the state record is explicit that the county itself is not financially accountable for it. Its working forms — the Noble County Fair Board, the Senior Fair Board and the Sr. Fair Board — are the same Society at work.
The Board numbers fifteen directors on staggered three-year terms. Membership is open to any person of eighteen years who lives in Noble County and pays the annual fee the Board fixes — one per person, none for a corporation, partnership or firm. The Society transacts its democracy inside fair week: the book sets the annual election in Caldwell on Friday, September 4th, 2026, from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m. in the Board Room of Schafer Hall, petitions due August 28th, 2026 and August 20 the last day to buy a membership in time to vote. The same book leaves the calendar to the Board, dates fixed subject to approval by the Ohio Department of Agriculture. OSU Extension in Noble County is the 4-H partner and publisher of the junior schedules; the Noble County Livestock & Sale Committee is simply the sale machinery’s entry-platform name.
Quick Facts
| Item | Detail |
| Event | Noble County Fair |
| Organiser | The Noble County Agricultural Society |
| Grounds | Noble County Fairgrounds, 44393 Fairground Road, Caldwell, Ohio 43724 |
| Host town | Caldwell, the county seat of Noble County |
| Season | The turn of August into September |
| 2026 run | Monday, August 31 to Saturday, September 5, 2026 |
| Daily gate | Fifteen dollars, with children two and under free |
| Grandstand week | Harness horse racing, rough truck contest, rodeo, truck pull and demolition derby |
| Fair week camping | Two hundred fifty dollars for the week, reservation fee included |
Three Dates That Refuse to Agree
This fair’s past arrives in three layers that flatly contradict one another, printed here without fusing them. The first is the fair’s own billing: the Society’s 2026 schedule page heads the event The 174th Annual Noble County Fair. Counted naively, that would reach back to the early eighteen fifties, but no document states what the count starts from. The billing is printed as a billing only: no founding year is back-calculated from it, and it proves no unbroken run.
The second layer is the state’s. Across its fiscal 2001, fiscal 2002/03 and fiscal 2004/05 reports, the Ohio Auditor of State records the Society as founded in 1952 to direct the operation of an annual agricultural fair — the Society’s founding in the state record, not a founding year for the fair itself, standing unreconciled beside the billing. The third layer is secondary: a Noble County travel guide states that the fair has been organized each year by the Society since 1852. Its date conflicts with the Auditor’s 1952, its each-year wording is the guide’s alone, and it is never the founding source for anything here.
For a useful comparison, see the Muskingum County Ohio Fair Festival for another county festival.
What the older record does support is racing: the audit cycles of 2001 to 2005 carry the standing wording that during the fair, harness races are held, and the fiscal 2001 statement preserves a Race Purse disbursement line of fifty-nine thousand nine hundred thirty-five dollars — era layers both, with current racing resting on the 2026 layers below. Agricultural-press layers add colour of their own years, including a junior fair livestock sale topping two hundred fifty thousand dollars in its year; no past sale figure is a current figure here.
What to Expect
Two Days of Harness Racing, Four Nights of Noise
The fair’s own 2026 schedule page publishes a grandstand event for every day. Monday and Tuesday both belong to harness horse racing, in the old style. Wednesday brings the Rough Truck Contest, Thursday the Rough E Rodeo, and Friday the truck pull billed as the 21st Annual J.R. Brown, Sr. Truck Pull — a numbering belonging to that event’s own history, not the fair’s edition count. Saturday closes with the Demolition Derby. The schedule names these events without prices, and no layer states whether grandstand entry sits inside the gate or carries its own charge, so neither is asserted. Beyond the grandstand, the Society’s own framing covers the rest of the grounds — midway rides, delicious food, exciting competitions, animal exhibits, and more — though the midway’s operator and general prices go unpublished in the record.
Barns, Halls and the Junior Fair
Underneath runs the Senior Fair’s premium machinery. The 2026 fair book takes entries at the Fair Board office from Monday, August 10, closing Saturday, August 15, 2026 at 4 p.m., with premiums payable from October 1. The Junior Fair shows its shape in the Extension’s 2025 schedule — rabbit and market poultry shows, a dog show, horse contest and roping shows, livestock shows and exhibits in Burkitt Hall — whose times govern 2025 only. Inside the 2026 week, the Extension calendar fixes 4-H Achievement Night on September 3, Junior Fair groups receive armbands through the Fair Secretary, and the book’s removal terms — animals out after 8 a.m. Saturday, all livestock gone by 2 p.m. Sunday — are exhibitor machinery, not an extra fair day.
Planning Your Visit
Timing the Trip
Hold the season as the turn of August into September, deliberately: the state record words the fair as a weeklong event during August, yet the documented modern spans straddle the month line, so neither month alone is the whole truth. The 2026 span, Monday, August 31 to Saturday, September 5, is corroborated five ways in the record, from the fair’s own schedule page to the state schedule. Earlier layers shift by days, not season: the 2023 press roundup ran August 28 to September 2. No complete fair-side senior span for 2025 appears in the record; its junior schedule opens shows on Monday, August 25, 2025, and a video layer catches the Rough Truck here on August 27, 2025.
The Gate Ladder, Exactly as Published
The Society’s Ticket Prices page carries no year; it is the current published ladder, printed as such with nothing back-dated. General admission is fifteen dollars every day at the Main Gate, children two and under free. Two tickets share the thirty-dollar line and must not be merged: the Season Ticket, and the Membership Ticket, whose buyer must be eighteen and live in Noble County and which, under the constitution, carries a vote for directors. The ride offer is narrower than it looks: holders of a season, membership or junior fair pass may pay seven dollars for a ride pass at the ride office — a pass-holder price only, beyond which no general ride price was published. No grandstand price for 2026 and no parking price for any year appears in the record, so neither is claimed. The 2023 press layer’s twelve-dollar figure governs 2023 alone. In its own layer the fair book bars free passes beyond those its rules list and admits uniformed servicemen and women presenting an official leave or pass; its late livestock entry of twenty-five dollars per head and fifty-dollar protest fee are exhibitor money, not a price of attending.
Staying on the Grounds Through Fair Week
Fair week camping is documented in the Society’s Camping during the Fair page, a standing layer carrying no year. Reservations run January 1 to May 1 for a seventy-five-dollar fee; the weekly rate is one hundred seventy-five dollars with water and electric included, two hundred fifty dollars in all with the fee — and no nightly figure is printed, so none is derived. The two areas are the Back 40 Campgrounds and Heritage Park, the latter the fairgrounds’ own heritage and camping ground, not a separate park. Cheques go to the Noble County Fair Treasurer, Jody Parrish-Polen, at the fairgrounds address; the page’s contacts are John Webster, Adam Schafer and Donna Spicer for the Back 40, and Brennan King and Donna Spicer for Heritage Park. The fair book adds one rule of its own layer: no alcoholic beverages outside the designated campgrounds.
A Saturday at the Fair
A closing day lends itself to a simple shape. Enter through the Main Gate in the morning, while the barns are busiest and the last of the week’s livestock remains ahead of the book’s 8 a.m. removal window. Give midday to the halls — Burkitt Hall’s junior exhibits, the Senior Fair’s hall departments, the horse arena. Keep the evening for the grandstand, where the Demolition Derby closes the 2026 week. Campers on the Back 40 or in Heritage Park walk back to their week-long base when the lights go down.
The Fair Measured Against Its Own Paper Trail
Set the Society’s current pages beside the older layers and the gaps instruct. The gate moved from twelve dollars in the 2023 press roundup to fifteen on the fair’s own current ticket page, but the page is undated, so the rise cannot be pinned to a year. The address layers the same way: the fair’s own pages give 44393 Fairground Road, and that number governs; a 2023 layer prints 44193 Fairground Road and a family-guide listing 44163 Fairground Road, the three standing unmerged. A fourth address, 10972 Cain Road, is the Society’s mailing layer, not the fairgrounds. Each layer belongs to its own document and year.
Before You Go
- Budget fifteen dollars a person for the gate, and nothing for children two and under.
- Choose between the two thirty-dollar tickets on their own terms; only the membership carries residency, age and voting conditions.
- Remember the seven-dollar ride pass is sold at the ride office to pass holders, not as a general public ride price.
- Check grandstand and parking costs on the ground, because the published record fixes neither.
- Book fair week camping inside the January 1 to May 1 reservation window.
Beyond the Fairgrounds
Caldwell rewards a short walk after the fair day. The village has been the county seat since its founding in 1857; its Noble County Courthouse, at 305 Courthouse Street, was designed by Charles J. Marr and dedicated on June 28, 1934. The county was formed in 1851, the last of Ohio’s eighty-eight counties organised, and named for State Representative Warren P. Noble — county and village history in their layers, setting rather than any part of the fair’s age. The fairgrounds lead a second life outside fair week: the Happy Time Pool, an old-iron power club show and a fall festival at Heritage Park, and the Society’s camping weekends, rentals and winter storage. All of it is the grounds’ business — none of it fair programme, none of its prices fair prices.
Why a Small Fair Like This One Matters
Noble County is Ohio’s last-formed and one of its least populous counties, yet its fair keeps the full architecture of larger county fairs: a chartered society, an elected board chosen in public during the fair itself, a premium book, a junior fair with its own achievement night, and a grandstand bill still opening with two days of harness racing. Its paperwork teaches something rarer. Where the record disagrees with itself — over addresses, the calendar, above all the fair’s age — the documents say so plainly, and a fair described honestly, layers and all, serves its county better than a tidier story invented on its behalf.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much does it cost to get in?
The Society’s current ticket page sets general admission at fifteen dollars every day, children two and under free. Season and Membership Tickets each cost thirty dollars but are different products; only the membership carries the age, residency and voting terms. No grandstand or parking price appears in the published record.
Is there harness racing at the fair?
Yes. The fair’s own 2026 schedule runs harness horse racing at the grandstand on Monday and Tuesday, and the state schedule’s asterisk marks this fair for harness racing that year. Racing on any other 2026 day is not documented, and none is claimed.
Can I camp at the fairgrounds during fair week?
The Society runs fair week camping in the Back 40 Campgrounds and Heritage Park, under a reservation system opening each year from January 1 to May 1. The published figures are a seventy-five-dollar reservation fee plus one hundred seventy-five dollars for the week with water and electric included — two hundred fifty dollars in all, with no nightly rate published.
When was the fair founded?
The record does not settle it, and this article does not pretend otherwise. The fair’s own 2026 billing counts a one hundred seventy-fourth annual fair; the state record gives the Society a founding in 1952; a secondary guide claims organisation since 1852. The three stand unreconciled; no founding year for the fair is asserted.
What to Expect From the Next Noble County Ohio Fair Festival
How often is Noble County Ohio Fair Festival held?
The fair is annual, held once a year as a week-long run — six days, Monday to Saturday, at the turn of August into September in Caldwell, in its documented modern shape.
When is the next Noble County Ohio Fair Festival?
The next documented edition in this record is the 2026 fair: Monday, August 31 to Saturday, September 5 at the Noble County Fairgrounds, billed by the Society as the 174th Annual.
Will the dates change?
They can move by days, and the layers show it: the 2023 run began August 28, a secondary list places 2024 from August 26, and the 2026 run opens August 31. Under the fair book’s constitution the Board fixes the dates subject to approval by the Ohio Department of Agriculture, so each year’s span is settled by that process, not carried over automatically.
Closing
The Noble County Fair asks little beyond turning up at the right end of summer: a fifteen-dollar gate, a grandstand that still belongs to the horses for its first two days, barns and halls full of the county’s own work, and a campground for those staying over. Read in its own layers, each with its year and its limits, the fair emerges small, completely formed, and exactly where Caldwell has always kept it.
