Over 40 past Miss Caneyville Fair beauty queens, dating as far back as 1952, will serve as the grand marshal of this year’s annual parade on October 3.

The ladies were invited to participate in the Caneyville Fair festivities as part of the 75th anniversary celebration.

All the past beauty queens will be honored on Thursday night during the 2008 Miss Caneyville Fair pageant by receiving a commemorative sash.

Caneyville Community Club President Deborah Lambert said, “most of the women still live around here. We are just ecstatic to have to ladies come out and participate in our 75th anniversary of the Caneyville Fair.”

New categories for Friday’s parade are a 75th anniversary category and Caneyville Elementary category.

“We have six classes who have built floats this year,” said Lambert. “The club gave the kids an incentive by giving $25 to each classroom that was interested.”

This year’s fair theme is Golden Reflection. The entire town is decorated purple and gold in honor of the school colors.

Also new to this year is the creation of a community cookbook. Lambert explained there were over 600 recipes collected from various people in the area.

She said the club started last year asking for people to submit their favorite recipes by mail or online. The cookbooks will be sold during the Caneyville Fair for $12.

The old Caneyville Elementary School will serve as host to several old-fashion games after the parade on Friday.

There will be an egg toss, wheelbarrow race, relay race, watermelon eating contest, Mountain dew chug a long, bubble gum blowing, and a three-legged race.

Saturday is armband night for the carnival rides, from 12-5 p.m. The cost of the armband will be $12.

An age-old favorite, the terrapin race, will start at 9 a.m. on Saturday.

Terrapins are placed in a circle, and whoever gets outside the circle first is the winner.

“Last year we had over 100 terrapins,” explained Lambert. “We came up with the event 10 years ago. The entry fee is $1.”

Trophies and cash prizes will be given out to the winners from each age category.

At 7 p.m. on Saturday night the old Caneyville Elementary gym will be filled with karaoke lovers competing for cash prizes.

Lambert said this is the first year for a light show that goes along with the karaoke contest.

“There are so many people who come home to Caneyville in October,” added Lambert, “It is a fun time for families to get together and fellowship with one another. You can just feel the love in the air from people in the community.”