Tuesday, October 3, 2023

The Mississippi State Fair is Upon Us

 The Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce issued the following statement. 

Commissioner of Agriculture and Commerce Andy Gipson and the Mississippi State Fairgrounds invite the public to experience new attractions at the 164th Mississippi State Fair and remind fairgoers of several items to “Know Before You Go.” The 2023 Mississippi State Fair takes place October 5-15 at the Mississippi State Fairgrounds.  

“The Mississippi State Fair is a time-honored tradition that showcases all the best livestock exhibitions, local artists and attractions, exciting shows and southern-style foods that our state has to offer,” said Commissioner Gipson. “Under the leadership of Mississippi State Fairgrounds Director Michael Lasseter, our fairgrounds staff has worked tirelessly to ensure the 164th State Fair will be bigger, better and safer than ever.”

Fairgoers can continue to expect the best of North American Midway Entertainment’s carnival rides and games, fair foods, pig races, the Zerbini Family Circus, live entertainment, livestock shows, an antique car show and much more. The Ag Expo, featuring the Genuine MS® Store and FARMtastic learning center, will be located inside the Trade Mart.



The Mississippi State Fair Beauty Pageant will take place Friday, October 6, at 4:00 p.m., and the Mississippi State Fair Talent Show will be Saturday, October 7, at 2:00 p.m., both inside the Coliseum. The Tri-State Rodeo will be held inside the Kirk Fordice Equine Center October 7-8. Senior American Day, which features live entertainment, muffins, coffee, door prizes, vendors and a health fair, will be held on Wednesday, October 11, at 9:00 a.m. Returning to the Kirk Fordice Equine Center will be the Horse, Mule and Pony Pull on Friday, October 13, and Saturday, October 14

Four nationally recognized artists will perform inside the Mississippi Coliseum: Josh Turner, ERNEST, the Commodores and Christian artist Jeremy Camp. Opening acts for these headliners include up-and-coming artists, and Mississippi natives, Todd Tilghman, Walker Wilson, Four Washington and Kayla Berry. A special ‘Cupid’s Line Dance Xperience’ will be held on Sunday, October 8. The comedy show, ‘Funny Friday at the Fair,’ featuring Mississippi native Rita Brent, JJ Williamson, Kerwin Claiborne, Marvin Hunter and DJ Koolaid, will take place on Friday, October 13. Local artists and bands will perform on the Main Stage, near the Midway, throughout the duration of the fair. All major concert and entertainment tickets purchased in advance include same-day general admission to the fairgrounds.

In addition to all the usual fan-favorite attractions, this year’s State Fair will feature an all-new ‘Taste of the Dixie National Rodeo’ exhibition and American Idol® Auditions. Several Taste of Dixie National Rodeo shows will run throughout the duration of the State Fair and will include bull riding, calf scrambles, bucking broncs, live entertainment and rodeo clowns. Taste of Dixie National Rodeo shows will start at 6:30 p.m. every weekday and at 2:30 and 6:30 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. Special guest, Forrie J. Smith, will also make an appearance at the Taste of Dixie National Rodeo to meet and greet fans October 7-8, at 2:00 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.

For the first time ever, the Mississippi State Fair will host a competition to recruit talent for the hit singing show, American Idol®, inside the Mississippi Coliseum. The semi-finals competition between the top 40 auditions will be held on Monday, October 9, at 6:00 p.m. and the top 20 contestants will then advance to the finals on Tuesday, October 10, beginning at 6:00 p.m. The final five artists chosen through this process will win a VIP Executive Producer Audition. Both singing competitions will be open to the public with fair admission and a ticket, which will be available for purchase at the Coliseum Box Office.

“For 11 days, the Mississippi State Fairgrounds will become a hub for all kinds of shows, concerts, food, rides, games and of course, our famous buttermilk biscuits, provided by the Mississippi Department of Agriculture and Commerce,” continued Commissioner Gipson. “The fairgrounds’ safe and family-friendly environment will offer an array of activities that everyone will enjoy, and I hope to see you and your family there.”

KNOW BEFORE YOU GO:

  • The 2023 Mississippi State Fair opens at 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, October 5. The ribbon cutting will be held at Gate 1 at the corner of Jefferson Street and Amite Street. The Biscuit Booth will be open early for those who attend the ribbon cutting. 
  • Gate admission is $5.00 per person, and parking is $5.00 per car. Children ages 5 and under will be admitted free of charge. The public can purchase advance admission tickets at the Coliseum Box Office until 11:00 a.m. on Thursday, October 5. 
  • All concert tickets purchased in advance include same-day general admission to the fairgrounds. Concert and entertainment tickets can be purchased in advance at www.ticketmaster.com and the Coliseum Box Office.
  • Fair admission is free every weekday from 11:00 a.m. until 1:00 p.m., except on Monday, October 9, Columbus Day.
  • Beginning at 9:00 p.m., any guest under the age of eighteen (18) seeking admission to the Fairgrounds must be accompanied by a legal adult (21 or older). Any guest may be asked to show official proof of age to be admitted after 9:00 p.m. Guests are encouraged to bring identification.
  • When entering the Midway, all guests will proceed through one of several entry security points utilizing a metal detector.
  • All bags are subject to search. The maximum bag size that will be accepted into the Fair is 12”x12”x6”.
  • No outside food or beverage allowed.
  • No marketing, soliciting, political, or vending items allowed unless and as authorized under Fairground regulations.
  • Pursuant to state law, the legal carry of firearms by all lawful adults is recognized on the Mississippi Fairgrounds.
  • No animals (other than service animals or as authorized by Fair management for Fair activities), banners, fireworks/explosives, or laser pointers allowed.


Find the complete schedule of fair events at www.msstatefair.com. For additional information, visit www.mississippifairgrounds.com, call the Coliseum Box Office at 601-961-4000 and follow the Mississippi State Fair on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

 

33 comments:

Anonymous said...



Legal Carry Rocks !

Anonymous said...

Man I ll bet the Kayla Berry or that dude from Brandons shows are gonna be YUGE!

YUGE!!!!!!!

Easily 40 maybe 60 people

Anonymous said...

Every year naysayers come out of the woodwork to share their negative thoughts about the fair. I think it's a pretty darn good one and the fair commission does what they can with the budget they have. So, lighten up, Francis.

Anonymous said...

Should be a good time. We look forward to going every year.

Anonymous said...

I love the fair. Always have. Too old to ride the rides now so we go to eat fun foods, enjoy the lights, and giggle watching the kiddie rides. Little folks are so cute, so excited! I would love to see Josh Turner. I've got one of his CDs and a DVD of him. Incredible voice.

As folks in my family got too old to go to the fair, we would take ziplock bags, pickup their favorite foods, then bring back home for them to enjoy. Corndogs, steak sandwich, taffy, pineapple ice cream, chocolate banana, funnel cake (mother's favorite), polish sausage dog with onions. Tons of good memories with the fair. I'll be there, with my ziplocks :)

Kingfish said...

They learned from the mudbugs debacle.

If you noticed last year, there was no midnight hours. Closing times were earlier. There was MUCH MORE police on hand. Started off slow but then word got out about the heavy law enforcement presence and more people attended.

Now if you are fearful anyway, go at lunch (although it's not great when temps are in 90s) or on Monday or Tuesday night. Those nights don't seem to have the yutes and are more family friendly.

Anonymous said...

The fair has great opportunities for Mississippi's morbidly obese Type II diabetics to get even fatter while raising their A1C. Oink, oink.

Anonymous said...

After a several year hiatus, I returned to the fair last year. In my almost 40 years, I have never felt that safe. You couldn't turn around without bumping into a LEO. I'm a metro area LEO myself and am usually very cautious about taking my family into certain parts of Jackson (I have started back to restaurants and other places within the CCID because of Capitol PD), but I will be returning to the fair this year. DPS did a great job of making safety a priority.

Anonymous said...

Andy, reckon you make me some biscuits?

Anonymous said...

When our kids were younger, we would always take them on the first Friday afternoon around lunchtime. You could get in for free, it wasn't very crowded, we would leave before it got dark, and it was still fairly clean. We never had any issues, and it was a good time for the kiddos.

Anonymous said...

Can we open carry again?

Anonymous said...

@10:17am - But you still have to enter the Jackistan city limits.

Anonymous said...

Somehow I got so old that now I’m like my dad. All I want to do is see the cars, crafts, and some live entertainment. Maybe a bit of food. Don’t care about the rides anymore. Still fun to see a (legal) teen titty pop out on an upside down ride. And that’s more common now than when I was in high school in the 90s.

Lock & Load said...

You still have to run the Jackistan gauntlet to get there. There were at least two drive-by shootings in the last week, one on I-220.

Anonymous said...

Nope. No chance after last year. Does anyone know if the Yazoo fair is safer?

Anonymous said...

@12:37
Good luck.
Rankin had an alternative fair at the Outlet Mall and they still had a shooting.
As long as the law forces business to let anyone in despite their shady appearance, this is going to happen anywhere.
Due to 60 years of “progress” we can’t have nice things anymore.

Anonymous said...

The fair used to be so nice, but we can't have nice things anymore because of, as KF accurately calls it, yutes. Anyway, the fair is an anachronism along with corsets, buggy whips. and truss advertisements in newspapers and magazines.

Anonymous said...

If you’re that scared to enter the city limits, then good riddance.

Anonymous said...

Would like some Malones taffy and a can of sugar cane molasses from those Alcorn Ag experts.

Anonymous said...

Love that taffy. Makes me remember when they use to have sugar cane sticks down there. I'm excited to go.

Anonymous said...

Assuming 2:23 stays in Jackson, that is a counter productive attitude for you to wish people good riddance. I would think the City of Jackson needs all the tourism dollars it can get.

Being rude to people who acknowledge the factual crime in Jackson is weird. It is facts.

Kinda like when Chuck shunned white business owners that plead for help. Most of those businesses left, but its good to see y'all are going to stubbornly keep that Good Riddance slogan. It works so well.

And for the record, I do plan to attend the fair in spite of your poor hospitality.

Anonymous said...

No, 5:28, there’s a difference between people who “acknowledge the facts” (by the way, I “acknowledge” that Jackson has a crime problem, so I don’t know what your point is) and those who want to play chaos monster and insinuate that if you so much as drive on 220, you’ll get shot at while driving on the interstate. If you’re that hell bent on trashing Jackson (likely because you don’t like the fact that it’s blue), then your token dollars don’t offset the fact that you’re ridiculous, and we aren’t worse off without you then we would be if you were to venture into the city one to four times a month.

Anonymous said...

@2:23 PM - Bless your heart.

Anonymous said...

Nope. Not until they bring back Blue Oyster Cult!

Anonymous said...

I want a foot long corn dog wrapped inside a pizza.
I want a funnel cake
I want a smoked turkey leg
I want to see whatever other new delights they have available for purchase.
I have too many thousands of dollars of dental work to mess around with taffy.

Anonymous said...

Ah yes 6:07. You are likely of the 'All cities have crime' cult.
You can whitewash or paint it in you favorite liberal blue, as you wish.

But telling others that they are the problem because they choose to avoid your city when even the liberal media must admit that the per capita murder rate in Jackson is similar to that of Tijuana lets me know that you are not interested in rational discussion.

I am not angry with you for enjoying your city.
It's odd that you seem to be annoyed that I don't share your fondness for the city though.

I hope all who attend the fair have a wonderful, safe time and perhaps avoid this angry resident who will no doubt be yelling at anyone that appears to be from out of town.

Anonymous said...

Yeah, 2:36, you’re definitely showing that you’re part of a problem. You make these outlandish claims (say, that Jackson’s homicide rate is the same as Tijuana’s), even though those claims are just factually wrong. They aren’t arguable, just plain false. (Believe me, I checked even though I knew what the result would be because your claim is just that outrageous).

If you want honest dialogue, we can have that. What you do instead is exaggerate and lie for the purpose of trashing our city. You expecting people to react well to you trashing our city is, as you put it, “odd.” Maybe you just think that you’re more important than you are.

Anonymous said...

Wasn't the attendance last year 100,000 off the previous attendance?

Andy is killing the Fair.

No one from Madison will attend anymore.

Anonymous said...

There is something so odd about those who are hell bent on criticizing the fair. professional bashers I guess. I like the fair.

Anonymous said...

I feel like the people who "bash the fair" are the ones that have great memories of it and wish is was still as they remember.

I dont think they are filled with hate or looking for a fight. They just miss their youth and the simplicity and safety they associate with the fair.

Its ok that some people prefer the current fair and its ok that some "bash it".

Personally, neither camp bothers me. It is ok to coexist with people of all opinions and not look for a war everywhere.

Anonymous said...

@11:44. I will feel so much safer knowing no wanna be thugs formerly of South Jackson and currently in Reunion are going to be attending.

Ran in to Comm. Andy while setting up with other vendors in the new Trade Mart building. What a great representative of agriculture, farming, timber industries, livestock and more!!! The industries that have kept MS moving for generations!!!!

Anonymous said...

@1:25 Okaaay Andy. You and Shad are awesome. Pat each others back and go watch broke back mountain.
G.

Anonymous said...

Andy Gibson: So are the LEO's going to harass those individuals lawfully concealed carrying without a permit this year, like they have every year, or not?


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