Another successful Thresher Reunion is in the books despite the wet, cold weekend
BY SCOTT STEPHENSON
It may have been a bit of a drizzly weekend in Blyth, but that didn’t stop the annual Threshers Reunion from going full-steam ahead! This past weekend marked 63 years since Blyth first hosted its annual celebration of the threshing arts, and it is always a weekend that imprints on the mind. Over the decades, this long-running community festival has created a self-sustained, immersive environment, complete with a working sawmill, a log cabin and numerous performance sheds that really give visitors a taste of what it was like to live the agricultural life in Huron County in days gone by. It‘s not just an opportunity to see some of the finest machines that have ever been made, it’s a chance to learn a little more about the evolution of the machines that have made it possible to produce the food that feeds our people for so many years.
The original idea behind the Threshers Reunion was a simple one - to reunite a gang of men who used to travel from farm to farm, threshing the fields. That group included local men like Jack White, Alec Manning, Hugh Chisholm, and a few of the Hallahan brothers - Dennis, Willie, Joe, Dan, John, Simon, and Raymond. Now, 63 years later, members of the Hallahan clan are still playing their part to make the Reunion run smoothly - eagle-eyed visitors that attended the event this past weekend may have spotted Dan’s son Joe lending a hand wherever need be. Joe Hallahan got his start with the annual celebration when he was still a child and his father was still working hard with the other founders to build up the campground into the unique, sprawling event space it is today.
That first Reunion was a chance for the guys to get together and remember the days before modern technology had made the old ‘threshing gang’ into a thing of the past. Invitations were sent out to other local threshers, and machinists were also encouraged to bring their steam engines and threshing machines to the reunion to show off. There were five steam engines at that first event, and the numbers have grown steadily since then. This year’s featured engine, an 18-horsepower John Goodison, did not disappoint. This particular engine, owned by one Geoff Scholes of Sarnia, is still a real beauty, even at 115 years old. Scholes’ machine may not be as big a behemoth as the statuesque Sawyer Massey that MPP Lisa Thompson was spotted atop on Friday, but it’s still a marvel of the modern technology that once was. The hand-painted logo near the back of the engine that reads “The John Goodison Thresher Co. Limited Sarnia,” is a nice little reminder that Southern Ontario was once a world-class hub of innovation for farm equipment.
The antique steam engines aren’t just beautiful museum pieces - they actually still run, which is both a testament to the construction of these machines and the skills of the machinists who tend to them. The ultimate proof of each machine’s functionality comes each day at 4 p.m., when all the engines proceed about the grounds in a grand parade. This year’s promenade marked the end of an era, as it was the last one to be called by former association president Jim Sloan. He’s attended almost every reunion weekend since the very beginning, and has announced the parade for over a decade.
The annual Threshers Reunion in Blyth has been evolving for so long now that it has its own storied history. Bea Houston, the association’s first woman president, was also the first woman to lead a steam show in Ontario. As part of her plan to make the reunion more appealing to women, she expanded the show to include homecrafts in the arena. The annual craft show has since grown over the years, and now attracts talented artisans from all over Ontario. This year’s craft show packed an impressive amount of artisans onto the arena floor. Upcycled garden art, stunning quilts, knitwear, one-of-a-kind Halloween decorations, tole painting, toy tractors and, of course, Threshers Reunion souvenirs.
Houston also introduced the idea of adding a youth education component into the mix. She developed the Friday of the reunion into a field trip day, which has now brought thousands of children into contact with their agricultural past. This year, the students created some truly inspired scarecrows, and thoroughly enjoyed observing how wheat and chaff were once separated during the threshing demonstration.
There were no formal plans to have a musical component at the first-ever Thresher Reunion, but every threshing gang tended to have a few musicians in the mix - a little music was a welcome way to unwind after a hard day out in the field. So it wasn’t much of a surprise when a few attendees that first year broke out their fiddles and started raising revelry. One of the threshers was also a step dancer who showed the others some choice moves. Today, music is almost as big a part of the weekend as the threshing and the antique engines. Entertainment Co-ordinator Gladys Van Egmond has ensured that the spirit of that first event is alive and well by putting on the annual fiddle and step dance competition, which was well-attended again this year by talented musicians and dancers from far and wide. The rainy weather also didn’t dissuade musicians of all stripes from coming out to the numerous jam sessions that go down all weekend long at various spots around the grounds. It was a veritable who’s who of local musicians with a proclivity for old time music.
One of the most recent additions to the reunion has been the Saturday night concert with The Lucky Charms. They may play a slightly more modern type of music than reunion favourites The Twilight Serenaders or The Country Versatiles, but their Beatles-heavy setlist could still be considered the music of a bygone era. After all, the year of the first Threshers Reunion was also the year that the Beatles were first recorded playing together in Germany! This year’s rain meant that the show had to be moved from the outdoor Harvest Stage to the safety of Shed 3, but it in no way dampened the enthusiasm of the crowd.
Providing good food has become as important a part of the reunion as it was for the threshing gangs back in the day. This year’s daily bean pot was a huge success, as always, as was Saturday night’s free steam-powered corn roast. Both the bean pot and the corn roast are great reminders of the old way of feeding the community - local corn and beans, prepared simply and in great abundance. The Blyth United Church also took over the top floor of the arena all weekend, and cooked up a storm that showed off the best of the country supper - turkey on Friday, roast beef on Saturday, and a soup and sandwich Sunday lunch for after the church service, which was led this year by Keith Roulston, who contributed some well-received words to the weekend about the miracle that is agriculture.
There is a wild alchemy that exists within the Thresher Reunion - it merges a nostalgia for the new technologies of the past with a desire to pass on the power of community-oriented rural spirit to the next generation. It reminds us all that, even though modern technology means we don't need to know our neighbours, it makes for a healthier, happier agricultural community when we do.