WEST SPRINGFIELD, MA (WGGB/WSHM) – As the United States moves closer to its 250th birthday next year, we continue our “We The People” series by highlighting one of the largest fairs in the country and it’s in our own backyard.
For 17 days each September, more than a million and a half people descend on West Springfield and, more precisely, 175 acres of former swampland between Memorial Avenue and the Westfield River. There are so many people that, for several days, the Eastern States Exposition attracts a large enough crowd to rival the entire population of Worcester, the second largest city in our state and that’s not by happenstance.
From the very beginning in 1916, Joshua Brooks and a dozen local leaders were thinking large and so they set about creating an exposition to help area farmers and businesses but, above all, to showcase and develop our regional economy. “It was large scale thinking on the part of important industrialists who were thinking ahead about how they could preserve industry and agriculture in this region,” said Eastern States Exposition President and CEO Gene Cassidy.
In fact, the original name for The Big E was the Eastern States Agricultural and Industrial Exposition and that first fair more than a century ago drew 138,000 people from all over the eastern states. Of course, the focus is now decidedly on New England, but Cassidy said those original eastern states also included New York, New Jersey, Delaware, and Maryland. “They all were part of the operation in the beginning and they were all vying for space on the fairgrounds to build replicas of their own statehouses, but we only had so much space,” Cassidy added.
So the die was cast with the Avenue of States dedicated solely to New England with the Massachusetts building the first state house replica in 1919 followed, in order, by Maine, Vermont, New Hampshire, Connecticut and, finally, Rhode Island in 1958. Also, each state actually owns the land their building sits on, which makes The Big E the only place where you can visit six different states in a just matter of minutes.
Right across the way, Storrowton Village Museum, is comprised of 10 historic buildings that date back to the 1700s and 1800s. The brainchild of Helen Osborne Storrow, a prominent philanthropist from Boston, she used $350,000 of her own money to move the historic structures to their current site on the fairground between 1927 and 1930 and it was in the 1930s that disaster first struck when the Great New England Hurricane of 1938 hit while the fair was in progress.
Less than 20 years later, the Great Flood of 1955 also caused damage, but The Big E survived, having only closed the gates a handful of times with the most recent being 2020 due to the pandemic and previously during the first and second World Wars. “There’s a lot of urban legends about what the property was used for by the war department, but I can tell you there was never ammunition stored here. People like to think there were tanks, there were tanks in the Coliseum. That wasn’t the case. It was all first aid equipment,” Cassidy explained.
The Coliseum is a focal point on the fairgrounds. Built in 1916 by the same Springfield company behind one of the most iconic skyscrapers in the world, the Chrysler building in New York, the Coliseum, like many of the other fair originals, featured massive glass windows. “For those of us who are native to the region, we always remember all the building having the windows blocked off. Well, the federal government did that, the War Department did that. During the second World War, they blocked all the windows…They didn’t want anyone to peak into the building and see what was here.”
Over the years, The Big E has provided plenty to see from world-class entertainment provided at multiple stages and venues to livestock competitions and shows, giant vegetables and other 4-H exhibits to the flashing neon rides and games of the midway. Oh, and who can forget, of course, all the food and drinks: fried, frozen, fresh, or foamy.
The Eastern State Exposition encompasses all that and more. It’s a special singular experience with friends and family, a tradition that swings around every fall and leaves memories that not only last throughout the year, but throughout our lives. True to it’s original mission, the Eastern States Exposition continues to showcase and develop our regional economy. According to a recent study, it’s economic impact on western Massachusetts last year was estimated at about $1.2 billion.
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