Photo Credit: Dawson Creek Exhibition and Stampede Facebook

By Shane Clausing

Dawson Creek Exhibition

Dawson Creek Exhibition President disappointed in cancellation, excited for next year

May 18, 2020 | 5:30 AM

The Dawson Creek Exhibition is looking towards the future after having to cancel the annual festival on May 8.

While they didn’t have much of a choice as the Government of British Colombia has banned all events where 15 or more people can attend, the announcement came as a disappointment to those who spend all year preparing for the exhibition.

The event typically sees over 40,000 people flood into Dawson Creek for the five days that feature rodeo sports, a carnival and a popular agriculture fair. It is held across 80 acres and those 80 acres are mostly filled.

“We thought that we could handle doing the agriculture fair, midway and run our beer gardens and we just would not do the area where the grandstand is because the World Professional Chuckwagons already decided not to run,” explained Connie Patterson, the President of the Dawson Creek Exhibition.

She adds that most of the chuckwagon races have already pulled the plug on their seasons and with the provincial guidelines, it was a long shot to pull off a successful event.

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This means that the parade for the exhibition is also cancelled. The parade is normally well attended and is a big part of the weekend.

While the exhibition will not go on this year, Patterson says that they’re still building and preparing for their 99^th anniversary in 2021 and the big 100^th anniversary in 2022.

“We’re still building and were a short way from there. We already lost some of our buildings due to age. We’ve got to replace two horse barns and then we’re looking at expanding our cattle barn.”

“It’s a big event and we’ll just be adding on to what we normally do. If you’ve ever gone to the Calgary Stampede it’s similar to that. Same cowboys and same party, just a different venue.”

2021’s exhibition is scheduled to take place from August 5-9.