Trumbull County Ohio Fair Festival
Each July, the Trumbull County Fair takes over the fairgrounds on Everett Hull Road in Bazetta Township, and visitors should first understand where it is not. Warren is the county seat of Trumbull County, yet Warren hosts no part of this fair. The grounds stand in the township, under a Cortland postal address, and the week belongs to barns, rings, a grandstand and a track rather than to any courthouse square. Harness racing opens the current fair, livestock fill the middle days, and the record behind the week stretches from an audited society founding in the eighteen forties to grandstand cards that change from decade to decade.
About the Fair in Bazetta Township
The organiser is the Trumbull County Agricultural Society, a corporation formed under Chapter 1711 of the Ohio Revised Code. In everyday layers the Society works through its Fair Board, also styled the Trumbull County Fair Board, while a separate Junior Fair Board handles the youth side of the week. Fifteen directors, elected from the membership on staggered three-year terms, govern the Society in the state audit layers, and membership is open to Trumbull County residents who pay the annual fee. The county itself is not financially accountable for the Society, even though the county commissioners appear during fair week as a presence with their own day and meeting rather than as organisers.
The fair’s published address is 899 Everett Hull Road, with Cortland, Ohio 44410 as the postal form on the Society’s own entry forms. Press layers describe the same grounds as standing in Bazetta Township at the corner of Everett Hull and Bazetta roads, about a mile north of State Route 305 where Hoagland-Blackstub Road meets Everett Hull Road. These are one grounds described two ways, and neither moves the fair into Cortland city proper or into Warren. The fair office can be reached on 330.637.6010.
Quick Facts
| Item | Detail |
| Event | Trumbull County Fair, held each July |
| Organiser | Trumbull County Agricultural Society |
| Grounds | Trumbull County Fairgrounds, Bazetta Township |
| Address | 899 Everett Hull Road, Cortland, Ohio 44410 |
| County seat | Warren, which does not host the fair |
| Board | Fifteen directors on staggered three-year terms |
| 2026 dates | Tuesday July 14 to Sunday July 19, 2026 |
| Current opening day | Five dollars admission, with a ten dollar ride pass |
| Current later days | Fifteen dollars Wednesday through Sunday, including grandstand events and rides |
| Parking | Free all week in the current published terms |
A History Kept in Layers
The state audit record says the Society was founded in 1846 to direct the operation of an annual agricultural fair. That date belongs to the Society, and this article prints it only as the Society’s founding. No layer fetched states a first-fair year, and the Society’s own current site carries no history chapter at all, so the organisation’s founding and the fair’s beginning remain two separate questions in the record.
What the local press record does carry is a chain of edition billings. The fair was billed the 156th in 2002, the 162nd in 2008, the 169th in 2015, the 170th in 2016, the 171st in 2017 and the 172nd in 2018. Those billings step year for year across the years they cover, yet no fetched layer explains what the count starts from, and the chain comes from the press rather than from the Society’s own current publications. They are never reconciled with the 1846 founding, and no edition number is claimed for 2026 or any other year outside the chain.
For a useful comparison, see the Summit County Ohio Italian-American Festival for another county festival.
Racing history needs the same care. Audit-era reports from the early two thousands describe harness races during the fair culminating in the running of the Buckeye Super Stakes, and that name belongs to those audit-era layers alone. In 2017 the local record states plainly that harness racing returned after a ten-year absence, which means the sport cannot honestly be described as an unbroken tradition at these grounds.
The calendar has moved as well. A 2009 press account records that the fair left its traditional July Fourth week for a week later in 1981, then voted to return to the July Fourth week for 2009 after twenty-seven years away; a 2011 schedule still shows that era’s Wednesday-to-Monday shape. The documented modern spans settle into a Tuesday-to-Sunday pattern instead.
What to Expect
Racing Back on the Opening Day Card
Harness racing is current and documented for 2026. The state schedule marks this fair’s line with its racing asterisk in both 2024 and 2026, and the horsemen’s association livestream schedule lists the Trumbull County Fair at Cortland on Tuesday July 14, 2026, at noon and at 4:30 p.m., agreeing with the trotting association’s fair list for that July. No purse, race card or circuit name was fetched for 2026, so none is promised here.
The Junior Fair at the Centre of the Week
The youth programme is not decoration at this fair; it is load-bearing. Extension guidelines for 2026 place exhibitor check-in on Monday July 13, with animals in place by 6:30 p.m., the Junior Dairy Feeder Show on Wednesday July 15 and the Livestock Auction on Saturday July 18, all inside the fair’s Tuesday-to-Sunday span. The 2026 junior board serves members aged twelve to eighteen under a junior fair coordinator named in the Extension layer, and the Society’s own entry machinery runs to deadlines of June 19 and July 10, 2026 in the forms.
Grandstand Nights Across the Documented Cards
No complete day-by-day senior card for 2026 was fetched from a fair-side layer, so this article will not invent one. The fullest fetched card is 2019’s, sourced from the fair board, and it shows the shape this fair builds when fully documented. That year brought drag racing with twenty-six classes as a fair first on Wednesday, modified auto races on Thursday, horse pulls plus a bull-riding rodeo on Friday, truck and tractor pulls on Saturday, and a closing Sunday of rooster crowing, skillet tossing, a cow milking contest, a dairy cheese auction with a Dress-a-Cow feature, a demolition derby and fireworks. Earlier cards add era layers of their own, from a fair pageant in 2013 to bus races in 2015 and a shark show with garden tractor pulls in 2016.
Village, Stages, Rings and Barns
The grounds’ fabric is named piece by piece in the layers. A Historical Village and its Historical Stage anchor the heritage corner, and a 2017 layer describes the village’s new beginning with exhibits from about a dozen historical societies. West of the grandstand stands its small red-and-white former Orangeville Jail building, built in 1845, housing its last prisoners in 1968 and moved to the fairgrounds in 1971, all in that 2017 layer. Bicentennial Boulevard and its stage, the Sawyer Ring, the Sale Barn, the Flower Barn, a Dairy Barn and show arena with a milking parlor, the Universal Show Ring, the Junior Fair Building, Oak Grove and a draft horse ring complete the plan. A 2009 press layer records about two thousand parking spaces stabilised with asphalt in that year, a grounds layer of its time rather than a current survey, and no fair-side acreage was fetched at all.
Planning Your Visit
Admission in the Current Published Layer
The fair’s own homepage publishes the current terms, and they govern the current layer only. Parking is free all week. Tuesday admission is five dollars, and a ride pass is available for ten dollars for those who want the mechanical rides. From Wednesday through Sunday, admission is fifteen dollars and includes grandstand events and rides. Senior citizens aged sixty-two and older pay five dollars Wednesday through Sunday, exactly as the homepage words that term, and it is not extended to Tuesday here. On Wednesday, veterans and first responders enter free with proper identification. Mechanical rides are free with a daily admission ticket, with one express exception: the mechanical bull is excluded.
Older Ladders Belong to Their Years
Prices at this fair have climbed in documented steps, and each step stays in its year. In 2019 the adult day was ten dollars, with one-dollar admission on opening Tuesday, rides at seven dollars on the special days, veterans free on Wednesday and children fourteen and under free on Thursday. In 2017 opening day carried a free gate with rides at six dollars, then eight dollars Wednesday and Thursday and ten dollars Friday through Sunday. The 2016 ladder set a weekly pass at eighteen dollars without rides and daily admission at eight dollars including rides, with seniors at four dollars, and the 2013 terms matched that eight dollar daily figure. Both 2011 and 2010 stood at seven dollars a day in their layers. No general gate for 2025 was fetched from any fair-side layer, so no 2025 price is printed.
Exhibitor Money Is a Separate Ledger
The Society’s 2026 entry forms price the exhibitor’s week, not the visitor’s. An exhibitor pass costs twenty-three dollars, with only one sold per exhibitor, and additional weekly passes in those forms cost twenty-eight dollars, an exhibitor-form price never presented here as a public weekly pass. A membership ticket costs thirty dollars, bought in person at the office in the forms’ wording, and open-class exhibitors must hold either the exhibitor pass or a membership. Entry fees run at ten percent of the first-place premium, minimum fifty cents.
Camping and Staying Over
Honesty matters more than a tidy answer here. The fetched record publishes no camping product for this fair at all: no price, rule set, reservation term or hook-up claim appears in the homepage, the entry forms or the junior fair rules. The state audit layer lists track and stall rental among year-round fairgrounds activities, which is a stall-rental layer and not public camping, and it states no fee. A multi-county 4-H camp that appears in Extension layers sits in another county and is not this fair’s camping. Anyone planning to stay over should ask the fair office directly.
A Sample Day at the Fair
Arrive on the Tuesday of fair week 2026 and the day builds itself around the track. Come through the gate on the five dollar opening admission, add the ride pass only if the midway is your plan, and be at the grandstand for the first racing card at noon. Spend the early afternoon in the Dairy Barn and the Flower Barn, then return for the second card at 4:30 p.m. On a Saturday visit instead, the documented anchor is the Livestock Auction on July 18, 2026, with the Sale Barn at the centre of the day. Either way, leave an unhurried hour for the Historical Village.
How the Modern Fair Compares With Its Own Record
Set the current published layer beside 2019 and the fair’s direction is plain. The gate has risen from ten dollars for an adult day in 2019 to fifteen dollars Wednesday through Sunday in the current terms, while Tuesday has become the value day at five dollars rather than the one-dollar special of 2019. What has not changed is the architecture of the week: a July Tuesday-to-Sunday span, racing attached to the fair in the state schedule, a junior fair running through the middle of it, and a closing weekend built around the livestock sale. The grounds also work beyond fair week through rentals and community events in the audit layers, and the Society promotes a separate fall event at the same grounds in September, a different occasion that is never part of the fair’s season.
Visit Checklist
- Confirm the current year’s dates before travelling
- Take Tuesday for the five dollar gate if your schedule allows
- Bring proper identification on Wednesday if you qualify as a veteran or first responder
- Remember the senior rate runs Wednesday through Sunday only
- Budget separately for the mechanical bull, which admission never includes
- Ask the fair office about camping rather than trusting terms published elsewhere
- Give the Historical Village and the former Orangeville Jail an unhurried visit
- Keep Saturday free for the livestock auction in the 2026 week
Beyond the Fairgrounds
A fair trip can stretch politely into the county around it. Warren, the county seat, holds the Trumbull County Courthouse at 161 High Street, a Richardsonian Romanesque sandstone building raised in 1897 and nicknamed the Stone Quarry and the Rock Palace in the courthouse record. Cortland, the fair’s postal town, is the natural stop for fuel and food on the way in. The fairgrounds stay busy outside July, so the corner of Everett Hull and Bazetta roads is a working landmark all year rather than a field that wakes once.
Why This Fair Matters
This fair matters because its record is unusually honest about what a county fair is. A society founded in 1846 still runs it through fifteen elected directors, the county keeps its financial distance, and the programme mixes harness racing, dairy shows, cheese auctions and demolition derbies without pretending any single element is the whole event. The gaps matter too: racing vanished for a decade and came back, and no camping terms are published at all.
Frequently Asked Questions
When does the fair run in 2026?
The documented 2026 span runs Tuesday July 14 to Sunday July 19, 2026, with exhibitor check-in on Monday July 13 and the livestock auction on Saturday July 18 inside that week.
How much does admission cost?
In the current published terms, Tuesday costs five dollars with a ten dollar ride pass available, Wednesday through Sunday cost fifteen dollars including grandstand events and rides, seniors pay five dollars Wednesday through Sunday, and parking is free all week.
Is harness racing part of the modern fair?
Yes, on documented layers. The state schedule marks the fair for harness racing in 2024 and 2026, and the horsemen’s schedule lists two opening-day cards on July 14, 2026, although the sport was absent for a decade before its 2017 return.
Can I camp at the fairgrounds during fair week?
The fetched record publishes no camping terms for this fair, so no price or hook-up can be confirmed here. Ask the fair office on 330.637.6010 before planning to stay over.
What to Expect From the Next Trumbull County Ohio Fair Festival
How often is Trumbull County Ohio Fair Festival held?
It is held once a year, in July, as a weeklong county fair run by the Trumbull County Agricultural Society at its Bazetta Township grounds.
When is the next Trumbull County Ohio Fair Festival?
The next edition follows the fair’s annual July pattern, running Tuesday to Sunday in its documented modern shape, with exact dates published for each year rather than carried over from 2026.
Will the dates change?
They have before. The fair moved away from the July Fourth week in 1981 and back again for 2009 in the press record, and modern spans shift by a few days each year, so checking the current dates is worthwhile.
The Trumbull County Fair asks only that visitors meet it where it actually stands: on Everett Hull Road in Bazetta Township, in July, with racing on the track, cattle in the barns and a little stone jail keeping watch over a week its county has long sustained.
