IT WAS to be an agricultural show like any other, with animals on parade, farm produce exhibited, contests and competitions and the novel attraction of "flying pigs".
But this year the Killeter Show at Castlederg, Co Tyrone, due to take place on Wednesday, has been cancelled. While no official reason has been given the organising committee made its decision amid rising sectarian tension and what many describe as a "a new low" in the small town, a boycott of Protestant businesses.
The show is just one casualty of the tensions which have increased since Drumcree and local conflict surrounding July 12th. Nationalists in the town say they have had enough of Orangemen "strutting" up and down their town in parades and keeping them prisoner in their homes. They have also, they say, learnt the harsh lesson of Drumcree.
Over a fortnight ago, eight business people in the town got an anonymous letter accusing them of being involved in the loyalist roadblocks and announcing a Catholic boycott of their businesses. It was signed "Yours disappointed".
They report a drop n business of 30 per cent. There are now signs of a backlash against local Catholic businesses.
Nobody - bar elected representatives - wants to speak on the record in this town which holds the unenviable reputation of being the most bombed area per head of population in Northern Ireland. It has a 50/50 divide between Catholics and Protestants. Community leaders say there is a bitterness now that was not evident in all that time of "turmoil and destruction".
Two weeks ago, the letters page of the Ulster Herald carried a letter calling on nationalists not to "give their money" to businesses owned by Orangemen and to buy only from Catholics since they "show their determination to deny fully their civil rights and equality to Catholics". It was signed "General Boycott".
On the same page Dissatisfied Shopper", the author of another letter, said he was shocked to see many of the businessmen in Castlederg standing at road blocks around the town or ensuring the Orangemen were "adequately refreshed".
"Do these people not realise that it is the Catholic/nationalist communities that are keeping their commercial establishments alive?" asked the letter writer.
He went on: "With last week's events, I have had my `eyes opened' and in the future will keep my `purse closed'."
The paper's editor, Mr Paddy Cullen, is unrepentant about printing the letters. "They weren't anything worse or anything more inciting than many other things that have appeared. It is not a view held by this newspaper but it is a view held by certain sections of the community."
Mr Cullen spoke from his office in John Street, Omagh, Co Tyrone, just yards from a premises on the same street which has a blackened facade and is boarded up. Inside is the burnt out shell of what was once a dry cleaner. The only Protestant business on the street two weeks ago, the premises was destroyed when it was firebombed by nationalists.
The proprietor, Ms Linda Fyffe, said there were about 400 items in the shop at the time. "I had about 100 pairs of trousers on just one rail. It is my customers that I feel sorry for. I'd like to think that those people were not picking on me personally but on the fact that it is a Protestant business.
"Myself and my husband Jackie get on well with everyone. We clean the kits for the GAA team and we sponsor them. I mean, Jackie supports Omagh Town," explained Ms Fyffe.
A nationalist who likes Fyffe appears to shrug off the incident. "Linda is a grand woman, but a lot worse things have happened. We have had people killed here, blown up, from both sides of the community, and they haven't received as much coverage as this incident."
In Castlederg, the boycott of Protestant businesses has been condemned by local clergymen. In a statement the representatives of all the local churches said the outcome of the last month and the "illegal and irresponsible" blocking of roads had led to a concerted boycotting of Protestant businesses and "an atmosphere of suspicion and distrust".
They appealed for calm and urged people to act in a Christian way. Even this statement has been the cause of controversy, with the clergymen getting flak from their respective communities about its contents.
The local parish priest, Father Jim McGonagle, prefers not to be quoted on the matter. "We have said what we have to say in the statement," he told The Irish Times.
A local UUP councillor, Mr Derek Hussey, describes the boycott of Protestant businesses as a "sinister" development at a time when people were working hard to increase business confidence.
The cancellation of the Killeter show was a sad development, particularly since it brought so many people from all backgrounds together, he said. The show had been running for eight years after a 17 year gap following an attempted shooting of an RUC officer at the show in the 1970s.
One man in Castlederg who failed to see the wisdom of calling for a boycott and the inevitable retaliations recalled the words of Mr John Hume. "An eye for an eye just leaves everyone blind," he said wearily.
However, a Sinn Fe' in councillor, Mr Charlie McHugh, believes it is an effective way for Catholics to show how they feel about the events surrounding Drumcree and July 12th. However, he does not believe it is an organised boycott.
"At the end of the day it is a peaceful protest. I do feel it would be a bad thing if an individual businessman who was not involved in the road blocks was suffering.
"Maybe now they realise how they depend on Catholic trade a lot more than they think and the spending power of Catholics. It might show them how sick we are of them marching up and down the town and into nationalist areas.
"They say the show was banned because of community tension, but nobody thought to ban a march through a nationalist area in Castlederg just a week after what happened in Drumcree."