Northern Fauquier County’s Upperville Colt & Horse Show Grounds is home to the oldest horse show in the country, contributing to a tradition of horse culture and history in Virginia. Recreation and sport are part of Virginia’s equestrian culture, rooted in the popularity of horse shows and racing. In the mid-1700s the recently-arrived Thomas Fairfax, 6th Lord Fairfax of Cameron, introduced colonial Virginia’s elite to the sport of fox hunting. A century later, Richard Henry Dulany of Oakley in Fauquier County, an avid equestrian from a prominent Loudoun County family, established the Upperville Colt & Horse Show Grounds in 1853, where Dulany sought to improve the care and breeding of work and sport horses. The facility is located along U.S. 50, near the village of Upperville. The Upperville Colt & Horse Show Grounds feature well-preserved historical buildings and structures of the late-19th- to mid-20th-century. This includes a ca.-1895 grandstand, roughly 180-feet long, facing on to the main show ring. Also on the grounds are a 1950 concession building, smaller warm-up and show rings, and stands for announcers, judges, and cameras. A wooden fence surrounds the 19.5-acre property, which the Dulany family sold in 1963. At the time of listing in the registers, Upperville Colt & Horse Show, Inc., maintains the property.