OKTOBERFEST

Oktoberfest, the world's largest beer festival, has been held annually since 1810 (excluding a few cancellations due to cholera epidemics and war). It began as a party in the fields southeast of Munich, held to celebrate the wedding of Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria and Princess Therese of Saxony-Hildburghausen. But it wasn't until 1896 that beer took center stage and the festival became what we know today.
The royal wedding of Ludwig and Therese was celebrated throughout Bavaria, and horse races in front of the royal couple marked the close of the event. Those races proved so popular that they were repeated the next year, on the fields called Theresienwiese (Theresa's fields) in honor of the crown prince's wife. Locals named the tradition the Oktoberfest.
Oktoberfest caught on quickly. An agricultural show was added in 1811, as a showcase to Bavarian agriculture. Seven years later the first carousel and swings made their debut. Beer wasn't yet the focus, though; visitors only enjoyed a sip or two at small beer stands. Over the years, the popularity of the modest beer stands grew, and convinced leading breweries and landlords to erect beer tents and halls.
However, the full transformation of Oktoberfest from an agricultural festival to a beer festival didn't take place until nearly the end of the 19th century; 1896 is seen as the turning point. Beer brewing is quite labor-intensive, and it wasn't until the 1890s that industrialization and refrigeration had developed enough to make it practical to mass-produce and serve the really large quantities of beer a proper beer festival required.
When Oktoberfest became focused on beer, its popularity took off. In 1950 visitors consumed more than 1.5 million liters of beer, a number that rose to nearly 5.5 million liters by 1998. With roughly 6.5 million visitors that year, that equals .85 liters of beer for every Oktoberfest guest

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