When the first Mid-South Farm and Gin Show was held 60 years ago, few probably gave much thought to the future of the event — that it would survive into another century and grow to nearly 500 exhibits, featuring equipment, technology, and services that couldn’t have been dreamed of then.

Yet, 60 years later, the show thrives, drawing thousands of the Mid-South’s top farmers and their families to Memphis each year to see the latest and greatest that agribusiness has to offer, to have an opportunity to get up-to-the-minute information on market outlooks and industry happenings.

From a cotton/ginning-oriented show, it has now evolved to encompass all major crops grown in the region, adjusting yearly to the changes in production that farmers have been free to make following the removal of allotments and quotas.

All that aside, the show remains much like a big family reunion — an opportunity for those in the fraternity that is agriculture to get together, share experiences, learn, and have a good time, as this gallery of photographs clearly illustrate.

—Photographs by Hembree Brandon, Elton Robinson and Forrest Laws of Delta Farm Press. Production of gallery by Slate Canon of Delta Farm Press.