Gay fair gay ga
Home / gay topics / Gay fair gay ga
Since then, the fair has been held on the first weekend of May and October every year, providing an opportunity for arts and crafts, live music and food centered around the town’s antiques business and agricultural roots.
The Threat
Because the grounds are active only two weekends annually, the structures remain largely abandoned and neglected throughout the year.
While the economic influence from the fairs is great, Gay doesn’t sit back on its laurels. But today, it’s tourism that is the main contributor to the town’s economy.
Gay, Georgia is a quiet hamlet of less that 150 residents ‚ mainly comprised of retirees who seek a quiet, simple lifestyle.
Gay began to expand its agricultural holdings when large landowners began to grow also grow peaches. The seed would later go on to cottonseed oil mills in Macon, Rome, and Atlanta. The Peach Packing Shed, built in the early 1900s, held workers packing fresh peaches into wood crates for delivery across the country. The rope drawn freight elevator still works to this day.
Built to house J.R.
Gay & Company, the 1911 Building is a 3-story, 8-room apartment and a small warehouse. The town experienced little growth until 1907, when a railroad line came through. Today it has changed names as it has with each successive owner, but the quality and dedication to excellence remains the same. While the economic influence from the fairs is great, Gay doesn’t sit back on its laurels.
Just up the hill, the Gin Scale sees a new life as a rustic stage featuring the country music of The Honey Creek Boys. The Trust’s involvement is limited to listing it on our Places in Peril list to bring awareness to it.
Images by Halston Pitman & Walter Sippel | MotorSportMedia and Summerour & Associates Architects
Gay, Georgia
Once known as Sasserville in the early 1800s, Gay, Georgia acquired its current name when the town’s first post office was opened and named in honor of William F.
Gay. A flourishing agricultural area, Gay’s primary crop was cotton until the 1930s. The marketplace boasts of nearly 300 dealers and craftsman peddling their wares.
Economic Development
Wildly popular throughout the region, the fair attracts nearly 100,000 visitors each year.
Gay, Georgia Fairgrounds
Gay - Meriwether County
The Story
Originally a small farming community, the town of Gay was incorporated after its first store and post office were opened by William Gay in 1882.
Through the 20th century, the small town flourished with the broader agricultural trends of the state—first cotton and then peaches. The Hammermill, where you can find festival information and live entertainment, was originally built to store corn that was used for cattle feed.
The Seed Cotton House and Seed House A stored and separated cotton and cotton seed.
The Cotton Warehouse, which now houses the Antique Center, was built before 1910 as a farming and building supply center. In 1972, after a period of decline in activity, descendants of William Gay established what became known as the “Cotton Pickin’ Fairgrounds” on the site of the town’s cotton gin and peach packing complex, with eleven original structures.
The West Gate of The Cotton Pickin’ Fair is the former front door of this building. With no prior effort to properly preserve the buildings, there is potential for deterioration and damage to the grounds in the off-season. Today, the building houses the Greenville Masonic Lodge BBQ. The Cotton Gin, which last ran in 1971, is where the cotton was dried, cleaned, and seeded.
Once there, fair goers enjoy an abundance of traditional Southern food and live entertainment.
A perfect complement to the Cotton Pickin’ Fair is right across the street ‚ at the Shady Days in Gay. The marketplace boasts of nearly 300 dealers and craftsman peddling their wares.
Wildly popular throughout the region, the fair attracts nearly 100,000 visitors each year.
The Georgia Tourism Foundation honored The Cotton Pickin’ Fair as a Founding Producer of Distinction, and the Southeast Tourism Society has selected The Cotton Pickin’ Fair as a Top Twenty Event. Judge W.F. Gay was appointed to serve as the town’s first postmaster in 1886 and was appointed as mayor when the Town of Gay incorporated in 1906.