In 1904, the Tampa Bay Hotel management was looking to attract more people to the site and organized to host the South Florida Fair. They developed a 27-acre plot adjacent to the hotel in the following years. It quickly became the Florida State Midwinter Festival and joined with Tampa’s Gasparilla Carnival in 1915. Thereafter, it became the Florida State Fair. Every year, there was a local holiday where children were given the day off to attend the Gasparilla Parade and the Florida State Fair, where the parade originally terminated.

It grew from having one building and simple attractions to a complex of structures for hosting agriculture and other exhibits and displays featuring local and state businesses. Royal American Shows railroad cars would line the tracks adjacent to the grounds where carnival workers lived and circus animals were kept. Enterprising youth could sneak back and peek at life on the road. Tampa -Gibsonton, to be exact- was the winter quarters for many of the workers in the off-season.  A flat track was home to car races, demolition derbies, and daredevil shows. The midway was packed with large carnival rides, games, food vendors, and freak shows.

In 1975, the Florida State Legislature created the Florida State Fair Authority, the official organization in charge of the event. That same year, plans were being made to move the fair to the East Lake area, which was 12 times the size of the original acreage. The old fairgrounds have been annexed into the University of Tampa, with few remnants of the former fair. The Florida State Fair was hosted at the Tampa Stadium temporarily in 1976 as the new fairgrounds were being constructed. The new fairgrounds, which opened in 1977, have continued to expand, with several buildings and an amphitheater that hosts concerts year-round. The fair now boasts an average of 500,000 attendees annually for the 11-day event, with over 90 midway rides.

 © Chip Weiner. All rights reserved