The Granny Smith Festival is an annual festival held in

Eastwood, New South Wales Eastwood is a suburb of Sydney, Australia. Eastwood is located 17 kilometres north-west of the Sydney central business district in the local government areas of the City of Ryde and the City of Parramatta. Eastwood is in the Northern Sydney ...

, a suburb of

Sydney Sydney ( ) is the capital city of the state of New South Wales, and the most populous city in both Australia and Oceania. Located on Australia's east coast, the metropolis surrounds Sydney Harbour and extends about towards the Blue Mountain ...

, Australia. It began in 1985 and is now the largest annual event of its type in Sydney's Northern District, attracting over 80,000 people each year. The festival is held on and around Eastwood Oval on the third Saturday of October to commemorate 19th-century pioneer Maria Ann "Granny" Smith, credited with producing the Granny Smith apple and celebrated for providing the

Ryde Ryde is an English seaside town and civil parish on the north-east coast of the Isle of Wight. The built-up area had a population of 23,999 according to the 2011 Census and an estimate of 24,847 in 2019. Its growth as a seaside resort came af ...

Hunters Hill Hunters Hill is a suburb of the lower north shore of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Hunters Hill is located north-west of the Sydney central business district and is the administrative centre for the local government area ...

area with prosperity. The festival begins at 9:00 am and concludes at 8:30 pm. The highlights are the Grand Parade down Rowe Street and the fireworks display. There are also stalls, community events, live entertainment, and rides. It is a festival tradition that the

New South Wales Mounted Police The New South Wales Mounted Police Unit is a mounted section of the New South Wales Police Force. Founded by Governor Thomas Brisbane, on 7 September 1825, the Mounted Police were recruited from a British military regiment stationed in NSW at th ...

lead the Grand Parade.

Festivals by year

2007

The Granny Smith Festival in 2007 was of particular significance, in that it became a major campaign venue for the Australian federal election, 2007. For the first time in the Festival's 22-year history, it was officially opened by the (then) local

Member of parliament A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members of ...

Prime minister A prime minister, premier or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. Under those systems, a prime minister is not ...

John Howard John Winston Howard (born 26 July 1939) is an Australian former politician who served as the 25th prime minister of Australia from 1996 to 2007, holding office as leader of the Liberal Party. His eleven-year tenure as prime minister is the s ...

. There were speculations that his appearance was largely due to the emergence of a serious challenge towards not just his Coalition government, but indeed his very own parliamentary seat of

Bennelong Woollarawarre Bennelong ( 1764 – 3 January 1813), also spelt Baneelon, was a senior man of the Eora, an Aboriginal Australian people of the Port Jackson area, at the time of the first British settlement in Australia in 1788. Bennelong serv ...

, from high-profile ALP candidate

Maxine McKew Maxine Margaret McKew (born 22 July 1953) is a former Australian Labor politician and journalist; she was the Parliamentary Secretary for Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development and Local Government in the First Rudd Ministry and the F ...

. Apart from Howard and McKew, a number of other local politicians, along with hundreds of volunteers representing numerous political parties and interest groups, attended the Festival, with a large contingent of media crew following their campaign trails.

2008

The 2008 Granny Smith Festival was of important significance with the Ryde by-election being held on the same day, Saturday October 18. This was triggered by the resignation of John Watkins who was the MP for

since 1995. An estimated 280 stores were set up in the 2008 event.

Since 2009

* The 2009 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 17 October with the headline act from

Eagles Eagle is the common name for many large birds of prey of the family Accipitridae. Eagles belong to several groups of genera, some of which are closely related. Most of the 68 species of eagle are from Eurasia and Africa. Outside this area, just ...

tribute act, Desperado - The Eagles Show. * The 2010 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 16 October with the headline act from

ABBA ABBA ( , , formerly named Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Anni-Frid or Björn & Benny, Agnetha & Frida) are a Swedish supergroup formed in Stockholm in 1972 by Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. The group's ...

tribute band, ABBA'S BACK. * The 2011 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 15 October with the headline act from MOTOWN, The Show! * The 2012 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 20 October with the headline act from

Blues Brothers The Blues Brothers are an American blues and soul revivalist band founded in 1978 by comedians Dan Aykroyd and John Belushi as part of a musical sketch on ''Saturday Night Live''. Belushi and Aykroyd fronted the band, in character, respective ...

tribute band, the Australian Blues Brothers Show."Granny Smith Festival Media Release 2012"
.

City of Ryde The City of Ryde is a local government area in the Northern Sydney region, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. It was first established as the Municipal District of Ryde in 1870, became a municipality in 1906 and was proclaimed as the ...

. Accessed 4 August 2013. * The 2013 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 19 October with the headline act from

Queen Queen or QUEEN may refer to: Monarchy * Queen regnant, a female monarch of a Kingdom ** List of queens regnant * Queen consort, the wife of a reigning king * Queen dowager, the widow of a king * Queen mother, a queen dowager who is the mother ...

tribute band, KillerQueen. * The 2014 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 18 October with the headline act Roger Galante. * The 2015 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 17 October. * The 2016 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 15 October with the headline act "Party Rock People" comprised in part by Jasmine-Jade and Nada-Leigh Nasser. * The 2018 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 20 October with the festival ending early and scheduled fireworks being cancelled due to severe raining and thunderstorms. * Festivals since 2020 went on hiatus on grounds of

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 ...

. * The 2022 Granny Smith Festival was held on Saturday 15 October with the headline act from

Dami Im Dami Im ( , , ; born October 17, 1988) is a South Korean-born Australian singer and songwriter. She represented Australia at the Eurovision Song Contest 2016 held in Stockholm, Sweden with the song " Sound of Silence", placing second and ach ...

References

External links

Ryde Council Granny Smith Festival website
{{coord missing, New South Wales Festivals in Sydney Apple festivals Granny Smith Eastwood, New South Wales