Pennsylvania Farm Show
Harrisburg, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
First held in January 1917, the Farm Show took place each year at various Harrisburg locations until 1931, when it moved to the new Main Exhibition Building here. The Large Arena first opened for the 1939 show. From modest beginnings, the Farm Show ultimately grew into one of the world's largest indoor gatherings devoted to the celebration and promotion of agriculture.
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
First held in January 1917, the Pennsylvania Farm Show began as a modest winter gathering that rotated among Harrisburg venues before settling into a purpose-built Main Exhibition Building in 1931. The addition of the Large Arena for the 1939 show cemented its permanent home in the state capital. Over the decades it swelled into one of the largest indoor agricultural expositions on earth, a January fixture where farmers, breeders, and butter-sculptors converge.
Why it matters
The Farm Show reflects how deeply agriculture shaped Pennsylvania's identity and economy, turning a working industry into an annual public celebration that still draws hundreds of thousands.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related events
- · Pennsylvania Farm Show
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Governor's Residence
Harrisburg, PA · est. 1996
This is the working home of Pennsylvania's governor, finished in 1968 on Harrisburg's riverfront. It is the third official executive mansion the capital has maintained, part of a lineage of residences that have housed the state's chief executives and their public duties. The house stands as the modern face of a tradition of gubernatorial hospitality reaching back generations.
Governor's Residence
Harrisburg, PA · est. 1996
Across Front Street stands the official home of Pennsylvania's governor, a Georgian Revival house completed in 1968. It is the third executive residence Harrisburg has hosted, succeeding the long-serving "Keystone Hall," which stood further south along the Susquehanna for nearly a century before being demolished in 1960. The marker captures a quiet moment of civic continuity — the passing of one seat of state hospitality to another.
J. Horace McFarland
Harrisburg, PA · est. 1995
J. Horace McFarland was a Harrisburg printer whose passion for beauty made him a national force in the early conservation and civic-improvement movements. As longtime president of the American Civic Association, he championed the "City Beautiful" ideal—that clean, green, well-designed cities uplift their citizens. He fought successfully to protect Niagara Falls from industrial exploitation and campaigned for the creation of the National Park Service in 1916. A devoted rose grower, he edited the "American Rose Annual" for decades from his Breeze Hill home and gardens in Harrisburg.
Pennsylvania Fish and Boat Commission
Susquehanna Township, PA · est. 2016
Just after the Civil War, Pennsylvania's rivers were being fouled by industrial pollution and blocked by dams that cut off the migrating fish that once filled them. In 1866 Governor Andrew Curtin signed a law creating a state commission to restore those waters and fisheries, among the earliest such bodies in the nation. From hatcheries to habitat protection and law enforcement, the agency grew into a model that other states and federal programs would follow.