The North Thompson Fall Fair and Rodeo in Barriere is celebrating its 75th anniversary this weekend.

Fair President Ed Salle says the fair – which is being held at the North Thompson Fall Fair Grounds & North Thompson Agriplex – has evolved over the years.

“Way back when I used to be in it earlier – my goodness it was just more of a rough and tough rodeo fair – a fair and rodeo – you know – it was nice but it was more rustic,” Salle said.

“Now its tidied up and organized parking lots and stuff like that and fencing everywhere and so its modernized quite a lot.”

Salle says the arrival of computers has made the fair easier to put on from an organizational stand-point.

Speaking on NL Newsday, he added that keeping the festival affordable has had its challenges over the years.

“You could bring in quite a few entertainment packages at a fairly significant dollar. Somehow that has to get covered off,” Salle said. “In days gone by we had a midway here for a lot of years and my first tenure as President back in the late 80’s early 90’s and it was a piece of entertainment that people quite bought into.”

“They liked it but we found that we were needing the grounds in the area more and thought from listening to other people say well – we let our midway go and we didn’t notice much difference, so we tried that and it worked.”

This year’s North Thompson Fall Fair and Rodeo starts Saturday morning and ends Monday evening.

Ticket prices were raised two years ago during COVID – but at $20 for adults, and free for children under 10 – Salle says the fair is still a really good value for a full day of fun.

For more information on this year’s festival, including a full schedule of events, go here.