History of the Show

Ten miles of electric cable, 200 tonnes of coal, 550 barrels of beer! These are huge statistics by anybody's standards. Statistics that Michael Oliver and his pioneering colleagues in the Dorset Steam & Historical Vehicle Club surely could never have imagined would apply to their own 'little show'. But that was 41 years ago when the show was in its formative days. How things have moved on in the time since!

Martin Oliver (now Managing Director) was a small boy in short trousers then, but he can remember certain things about the early shows, with his father very much at the helm. He too can not have imagined then that one day he would preside over the biggest steam and vintage show in the World. But gradually Michael has taken more of a back seat and now it is Martin that is charged with the task of leading the show through the early part of the 21st century. Regulars at the Great Dorset Steam Fair will know why it is sometimes still called 'Stourpaine', but how many of the many thousands of exhibitors and visitors really know how it all began?

Believe it or not it is railways that we have to thank for the spark that got it all going, not the traction engine as many might expect. For it was Michael's love affair with the legendary Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway, which ran close to the family home, that was the catalyst for what we take for granted so much today.

As a boy, Michael used to catch the train from nearby Shillingstone to Blandford Forum to get to school, and then later in his teenage years, he would continue through to Bournemouth on a Friday or a Saturday, getting the last train home after a night on the dance floor, Beetle Crushers, drainpipe trousers and all.

He wasn't slow to notice the downturn in railway traffic and had the foresight to record on cine film, some of the last train movements on the line before closure in 1966. With the sad passing of the railway from the rural Dorset communities that it had provided such a lifeline for, there was a great deal of local sadness and anger, not to mention a growing appreciation and affection too. But isn't it often the case that you only really miss something when it's gone and it's too late to do anything about it?

The skittle alley at the Royal Oak pub at nearby Okeford Fitzpaine was booked to show Michael's film and such was the level of interest that there had to be five sittings to accommodate everyone who wanted a last glimpse of trains on the old S&D.

Ted Hines from Shaftesbury remarked that there was enough interest in the area in old steam and vintage tackle that there was the basis of a club in the offing. Ted had a small museum at Shaftesbury with seven fair organs and was also home of Burrell showman's engine No.3938 ‘Quo Vadis’. Subsequently, this engine would become the show's mascot and to this day is still held in high regard, given pride of place as steam exhibit number one in the catalogue every year.

Michael thought about what Ted had said and suggested putting on a small gathering on a patch of land adjacent to his museum.

Between them they got local enthusiasts to bring along their engines and tackle with the aim of having a silver collection to raise money for a cancer charity.

Things went well, but it was obvious that more land was required, so in 1968 Ingram Spencer of Hamworthy Engineering in Poole was approached to see if he would let them have some land at Hanford Park. "You're not putting it on 'ere" he told them "Go see Alan Reid, we've got 400 acres at Stourpaine village!" And so it was, that the first rally proper, took place in 1969 in fields close to the River Stour.

Percy Cole brought his magnificent Gondola ride over from Somerset (it now resides at Thursford Museum in Norfolk) and Bill Dorman from Nottingham brought along his roundabout. Everything that could be worked was worked - steam engines, tractors, machinery - an ethos which is still adhered to up to this day, as far as possible.

By 1971 the show had moved to the immortal Stourpaine Bushes and steadily began to grow in popularity and size, then, after many trouble-free years, disaster! With just three weeks to go to the 1985 show, the site was lost following a dispute with the landowner. Miraculously a new site just a mile away at Everley Hill was found and arrangements hastily made to re-house the show there. The site served the show well for three years, but Michael knew that a bigger, more permanent site was needed.

Michael bumped into Keith Hooper, a local farmer, at the funeral of Jim Bamsey, who was a stationary engine man: "You haven't got a few hundred acres have you?" he enquired, "we'll pay rent". Keith's eyes lit up and he immediately arranged a meeting on site at Tarrant Hinton along with his son Robin and proceeded to show Michael the 600 acres of land that is the showground today. "We're in 'ere alright!" Michael told himself and he was right.

Since moving to Tarrant Hinton the show has seen massive growth and the amount of administration and organisation has mushroomed too. Yet the show is still run from the Oliver family home in Child Okeford, which is perhaps appropriate as the family name very much has its roots in the village, going back hundreds of years - even the village church has a stained glass window bearing the family name.

Michael's father used to thrash with steam, so as well as railways, steam traction engines were always dear to the young Michael's heart. His mother was one of the Clarke family from Street in Somerset - famous for their exploits in the shoe industry - Annie Clarke marrying Michael's great grandfather, who was one of the Northampton based Olivers who were also leaders in the shoe industry of the day.

The Child Okeford based Olivers were dairy farmers though, with Tom Oliver's Dairy located where the family home is now - hence Dairy House Farm. Michael and his family lived close by at Dairy Mead, but his auntie left the farm house to him and the opportunity was seized to move back into the ancestral home.

In 2004 Martin had plans passed to build a block of offices for the Steam Fair and the building work was completed in January 2005. The move into the new offices enabled Mum and Dad to have their front room back at long last after 37 or so years! Martin as Managing Director now fronts up the show of what is formally the Great Dorset Steam Fair Ltd.

There are two full time staff in total plus six part time staff members who send out 360,000 promotional brochures, 65,000 car window stickers and 50,000 posters each year, as well as dealing with all the enquiries and other administration. A dedicated 'Advance Booking' hot line is open until 13th August and handles most of the ticket enquiries.

Meanwhile over at Tarrant Hinton much work has gone on to improve the site, with a number of hardcore roads laid and water pipes connected up. When part of the nearby Blandford Army Camp was being demolished Michael invited them to deliver the rubble down to the show site so that it could be broken up as hardcore for the roads, which saved them having to cart it off to a landfill site somewhere.

It's a sobering thought that the show has 25,000 people camping on site at any one time - that's the population of a small town. Back at Shaftesbury in 1968 the show enjoyed 10,000 visitors. At Everley Hill this had grown to 60,000, whilst today the show regularly attracts over 200,000 people. Michael told me that once the Western Daily Press dismissed the show's apparent success by saying; "It's a passing phase, like pushbike speedway". Michael retorted by saying that one day there would be 100,000 visitors. "The next year" he said, "we did it!"

Originally, like most steam and country shows, it opened just at weekends, but in the mid 1970s Michael experimented with opening on the Friday. "It was a huge success. So much so that we moved on to four days in the 1980s and then five days from 1988. We tried eight days in 1992, but the less said about that the better!" he told me.

The other major change has been the dates. It used to be in mid-September but it always seemed to rain. Then one day whilst on the quayside in Poole a fisherman collared him and said "You've got the wrong weekend. We wouldn't even go out Mackerel fishing that weekend". Apparently this was the time of the Autumnal equinox when the number of daylight hours equals the hours of darkness. Harry Lee had told Michael after nine consecutive years of bad weather to "Stick it out, one day it's bound to come good", but there seemed to be more to what the fisherman said than an old wives' tale, so it was decided to bring it forward to the week after the August bank holiday. Sometimes it is still wet of course, but there have been plenty of gloriously dry (and dusty) shows since. "It used to be so bad" said Michael "that Frisby's Shoe Shop in Blandford used to look forward each year to staging a huge welly boot promotion.

"One year at Stoupaine Bushes we couldn't get some of the ploughing tackle out of the fields until Boxing Day". And it wasn't just the rain that brought the show problems; "We've had the beer tent blow down" he continued, "And we always used to have this portable bell tower supplied by Whitechapel Bell Foundry in London. They used to leave it to us to build the frame, which took three days, and one year we built it the wrong way round. So we had to dismantle it and start all over again. Another year the tower actually blew over! Another year the Wall of Death tilt blew off and the timber supports splintered". He can laugh now, but at the time it wasn't so funny.

What have been some of the highlights for Michael over the last 40 years? "One year we had four sets of gallopers. James Horton from Chichester, Jim Noyce from Aldershot, David Downes from Witham and John Forrest who came over from Kent. It was quite a sight, even if it did spread the revenue 'jam' a bit thinly for each operator. George Cushing came on the Saturday and stayed here until 11 o'clock at night, just taking it all in. "I never thought I'd see four sets of gallopers on one site" he said. Then there was the 100 showman's line up in 1993. We had to cheat a bit with a few miniatures, but it was still an incredible sight. Another year the Seaton Tramway people laid some track and ran trams through the woods at Stourpaine Bushes". I asked Martin the same question and he had no hesitation "The Burrell year in 2000 and the 40th Anniversary show in 2008 have been the highlights for me".

There have been many themes over the years including portables, Fowlers and pre-1930s tractors. Were there plans for similar gatherings in the future? What are Martin’s thoughts about how he might take the show even further forward? "There's not a lot that hasn't been done. I want to improve the site itself and the facilities, which I think we have been gradually doing over the last few years. I would like to build permanent toilet blocks, but so far the Councils haven't been keen. There will be more special gatherings over the years I'm sure - themes might include Lincolnshire-built engines for example. I would also be interested in laying a permanent railway to help move people around the site.

After a period of illness a number of years ago, Michael handed over the reigns of the show to son Martin, but was this something Martin had really wanted to do? "I left school in 1982 and went to work for Dorset County Council in their offices for about eight years. In 1990, with the show getting noticeably bigger, it needed more admin help. I didn't fancy staying at County Hall for 40 years, so I packed the job in and went full time with the show. Everyone mucked in and I have to say I've enjoyed it. I try to run it the old way, like Dad, very informally. Although you do have to be very business minded these days, with more regulations and Health and Safety to worry about and a lot more dealings with the authorities. It's sad, but I think a lot of shows will go under because of all this red tape. Organisers simply don't need all the extra hassle and with costs shooting up - ours have gone up by £100,000 a  year over the last 5 years - for some it simply won't be worth their while carrying on".

The show, which this year will cost around £1.8 million to stage, couldn't run without its army of helpers and section stewards. In total there are about 300 people working at the event including the casual labour that collects litter and man campsites etc. As well as the two executive directors (Michael & Martin), a group of non-executive directors make up the Great Dorset Steam Fair's committee and they meet every month to plan the next show - which incidentally gets under way as soon as the previous one is over.

"It gets crazy at times" Martin says "we've got a huge mailing list of 50,000 individual names (that's one person from a family who has visited the show before) including people from such diverse places as Iran and Japan. We've had people trying to book in for 2010 and 2011 already and I had to go out and buy a calendar from Smiths to check the dates!" There is no doubt that Martin intends to keep running the show in the way that his father has always done, but is the show's long-term future safe? Martin has three children, Robert (14), Tom (11) and Holly (10). "They're all into it" Martin said with a smile. Just like that small boy in the late 1960s when it all began, it is quite possible this new generation of young Olivers might just be 'taking it all in' ready for the call to family duty.

The above information has been edited from an article written by Paul Appleton. Many thanks to Paul for his kind permission to use the article.