SEVENTY-SIXTH 



Annual Cattle Show and Fair 



The Cattle Show and Fair of this society 0[)eiied on 

 Sept. 22, 1896, with the promise of good success, but before 

 noon it began to rain and continued through tlie day, but 

 Wednesda}' the weather was perfect and the attendance 

 was the largest on record. 



The exhibits in all departments were larger than for 

 many years, and on the, whole it was the most successful 

 fair the society ever held, there being about one hundred 

 head of cattle on exhibition and neaily the same number 

 of horses. The poultry exhibit was especially fine, repre- 

 senting more than five hundred fowls of different breeds 

 and varieties. At the ploughing match there were not so 

 many entries as usual, but those that did plough did good 

 work and drew quite a large attendance to witness it. 



Wednesday morning the citizens of Peabody, Salem and 

 adjoining towns had a street parade of the business firms 

 of those places, which was a very fine -display and drew 

 thousands of people to witness it. This parade was a horse 

 and cattle show of itself, being a procession over a mile in 

 length, composed of some of the finest horses in the coun- 

 t}', and notably among the rest a team of nine yoke of 

 oxen from the Danvers Asylum. The annual address 

 before the Society was delivered Thursda3% in the Pea- 

 body Institute, by Hon. Robert S. Rantoul, of Satem, of 

 which no praise is necessary to convince anyone that it 

 was able and interesting, going back to the earliest history 

 of the Society and giving a brief history of its work up to 



