The Florida Strawberry Festival is an annual event taking place in

Plant City Plant City is an incorporated city in Hillsborough County, Florida, United States, approximately midway between Brandon and Lakeland along Interstate 4. The population was 39,764 at the 2020 census. Despite many thinking it was named for flora ...

Florida Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...

. The festival lasts 11 days and generates attendance of about half a million patrons from all across Central Florida and other areas. The festival is considered one of the best in Florida and ranks among the Top 40 Fairs in North America. The festival is a venue for

flea market A flea market (or swap meet) is a type of street market that provides space for vendors to sell previously-owned (second-hand) goods. This type of market is often seasonal. However, in recent years there has been the development of 'formal' ...

-style craft and item sales, various free entertainment acts/events, a very large midway, plus twice-daily "big name" musical concert performances.

History

The idea of the strawberry festival was conceived of by the Plant City

Lions Club The International Association of Lions Clubs, more commonly known as Lions Clubs International, is an international non-political service organization established originally in 1916 in Chicago, Illinois (''City in a Garden''); I Will , ...

in 1930, after several attempts made by locals to promote the local

strawberry The garden strawberry (or simply strawberry; ''Fragaria × ananassa'') is a widely grown hybrid species of the genus '' Fragaria'', collectively known as the strawberries, which are cultivated worldwide for their fruit. The fruit is widely ap ...

crop. The first Florida Strawberry Festival was held in the same year. The festival occurred annually for 11 years until World War II halted operations from 1941 to 1947. The

American Legion The American Legion, commonly known as the Legion, is a non-profit organization of U.S. war War is an intense armed conflict between states, governments, societies, or paramilitary groups such as mercenaries, insurgents, and militi ...

, Post #26, helped get the festival reactivated in 1948. In 2021, the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic, also known as the coronavirus pandemic, is an ongoing global pandemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The novel virus was first identif ...

led to

social distancing In public health, social distancing, also called physical distancing, (NB. Regula Venske is president of the PEN Centre Germany.) is a set of non-pharmaceutical interventions or measures intended to prevent the spread of a contagious dis ...

and other similar measures being employed.

References

External links

* Festivals in Florida Food and drink festivals in the United States Tourist attractions in Hillsborough County, Florida Strawberry festivals 1930 establishments in Florida Festivals established in 1930 Plant City, Florida Annual events in Florida {{US-cuisine-stub

History

See also

References

External links