You might check the work by Charles Wynes on the beginnings of segregation in
Virginia. The law requiring strict segregation in public events did not pass
until 1924. I recall that there was a good discussion of blacks at the North
Carolina State Fair in the 1880s in a book by Frenise Logan on the Negro in
North Carolina, 1865-1900.

Jim Hershman

Michael Trotti wrote:

> Greetings,
>
> I pursued this issue a bit when I was a graduate student.  In fact, an
> article on
> amusements in Richmond at this time -- including the issue of racial
> segregation
> and mentioning the fairs -- is forthcoming in the next . . . and, sadly,
> last . . .
> issue of the Virginia Cavalcade.
>
> Here are a few things I found:
>
> Blacks were mostly invisible in the white press coverage of fairs –
> perhaps few
> attended, perhaps the press avoided mentioning them.  Judging by other
> evidence,
> African-Americans were not made at all comfortable in such places (see
> the Richmond Planet, May 11, 1907 on Jamestown Exposition, for
> instance).  For its part, the Planet never mentions the State Fair in
> this era, which I think is telling.
>
> The special Exposition of 1888 in Richmond included a “colored
> department” and
> “colored day” when blacks could attend at half price (was it an accident
> that
> “colored day” also happened to be Halloween?).  Another aside, “colored
> day” was
> the day of highest attendance of the Exposition and perhaps was the
> largest
> concentration of African Americans in one spot in Richmond’s history to
> that point.
>
> There was no Virginia State Fair from 1896, in the midst of depression
> and after
> years of shortfalls, to 1906, when a revived (and moved – from where the
> DMV is now to where the Diamond is now) State Fair began again.
>
> Eddie Drummond, a black Richmond youth, attended the fair in 1910 and
> 1911
> according to his diary in the Valentine Museum.  So at that point it was
> not
> segregated . . . or rather blacks could attend, but they MUST have been
> forced to
> use different, segregated bathrooms and eating/drinking facilities.  I
> think that
> is just a given.
>
> There were also separate black fairs.  In July 1915 there was a
> particularly large
> Negro Historical and Industrial Exhibition, lauded by the white press
> and
> criticized by John Mitchell’s Planet.  Other black fairs were held in
> 1884, 1891,
> and 1892 . . . and perhaps other years I did not find.
>
> This is a very interesting issue – good luck pursuing it.
>
> Michael Trotti
> Ithaca College
>
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