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Despite just coming off a major 34-0 loss to UNC, A&M's football team looked the best they had looked in quite some time. A&M's next competitor was one of two teams which the Farmers had had scheduled since late September. The early September schedule read simply "Bingham School," a broad term which readers of the 1897 game against Bingham might recognize the dangers of. On October 20th, both the News and Observer and the Morning Post erroneously reported that the game would be played against the "Bingham school, of Asheville," the Robert Bingham team, when in reality the game was against the William Bingham team, of Mebane. This fact can be verified in a few ways: first a foremost, the Asheville Daily Citizen reported a statement by the Bingham School of Asheville stating that they did not in fact play the A&M team; a secondary method of verification of this claim could be made by comparing the team given in Bingham's roster for the game to either their 1898 players or the Asheville team of 1899 (who was much better documented) and noting that some of the players in the 1899 A&M game match the names of players from the 1898 game (namely Mangum), while none of the players match the Asheville roster names. Finally, the Tar Heel reported that the Bingham team was the William Bingham team (The (Raleigh) Morning Post, September 22nd, 1899, p. 5; The (Raleigh) Morning Post, October 20th, 1899, p. 6; News and Observer, October 20th, 1899, p. 5; The Tar Heel, October 25th, 1899, p. 2; Asheville Daily Citizen, October 23rd, 1899, p. 1; Asheville Dailt Citizen, October 27th, 1899, p. 7).

Coming in to the game, I could only find one game played by William Bingham: a 6-5 loss to Guilford. Reportedly, "Guilford won on the old revolv-trick [sic]. It is said that Bingham has decidedly the better team." The revolving trick play the Tar Heel was likely alluding to was the "revolving tandem" play, where a team swung one tackle from where he started at the snap to double team the opposite tackle, forming a wedge to help push the ball through the line (The Tar Heel, October 11th, 1899, p. 2). Both teams going in to the game were described as "in first-rate training and condition," with multiple papers writing that an exciting game was expected The (Raleigh) Morning Post, October 20th, 1899, p. 6).

And more than ever, it was important for A&M to have an excellent game; this game was a central point of the 1899 North Carolina State Fair. Though horseracing had long been the most popular sporting event at the State Fair, football had appeared infrequently since 1888, with Wake Forest and the University of North Carolina providing the men for the first game; Wake Forest won the first game held at the fair grounds 6-4. Though some attempts were made to organize a game in 1889, football was not played as a part of the State Fair until four years after the first game, in 1892. That year, A&M's team beat a joint team composed of men from their own scrub team and members of the Raleigh Male Academy, the Farmer-only team winning 8-4. In 1893, Trinity (now Duke) and Wake Forest met in the final State Fair game until 1899; Trinity won the game 12-6 (Jim L. Sumner, pp. 141, 146-147).

Not only was this game the first football game to take place at the State Fair in 6 years, but there were also record crowds attending the fair that year. The News and Observer reported that on the 19th, "Fully 20,000 people entered the gates during the day," while another summary of the fair claimed that "It is perhaps not an extravegant estimate to say that... 30,000 visitors were admitted." Of those tens of thousands of visitors, a reported 5,000 came out to watch the game between the Cadets and the Red and White, making this game by far the largest reported attendence of an A&M football game to date, reaching crowds of more than 10 times their largest reported crowd sizes from the 1898 season, and just over one and a half times larger than their largest crowd to date, a generously-estimated 3,000 reported to have crowded into Wilmington's Hilton Park to watch the A&M play the Wilmington Athletic Club on Thanksgiving Day, 1894. With their largest crowd ever, the Red and White were playing the team who beat them 22-12 the previous year (News and Observer, October 20th, 1899, p. 5; News and Observer, October 21st, 1899, p. 5).

The weather was described as "too hot for snappy football," with the overall work of the two teams being described as "rather lethargic" aside from a few exceptional runs. The game was negatively described by the News and Observer as "not particularly satisfactory to the knowing ones, but nonetheless interesting" to the casual fans. "Neither eleven showed good team work," and noted that though A&M showed itself capable of making nice plays, the team instead preferred to "depend on the weight of its line."

The game started at 2:30 PM in the State Fair Ground's grand stands directly after the horse races. It was played in two 20 minute halves.

Unfortunately, the two existing reports of the game vary greatly at some points in their description of the game. A&M won the toss and chose to kick to start the game, Person kicking the ball 35 yards to Winston of the Cadets, who carried the ball 5-10 yards before being downed by McKinnon. Here, the papers diverge greatly in their game summary. The Morning Post writes that the Black and Red managed to gain a little over 10 yards via Winston, Johnston, and LeGrande, but, on second down, Winston "was given the ball, but fumbled and was thrown back 10 yards." Winston then reportedly attmepted to kick the ball away, but his kick was blocked by Caserley, giving A&M the ball. The News and Observer, on the other hand, wrote that Winston, Johnston, and LeGrande worked the ball up the field, but, after Clay and Johnston failed to convert for a new set of downs, "Winston kicked the ball 50 yards to Person who carried it back 10." The newspapers then come back to mostly agreeing, writing "Newton then made the most brilliant play of the day," running 45 yards around the left end with the help of his linemen, who "blocked splendidly." Newton was tackled on Bingham's 20 yard line. "Then, pandemonium broke loose and it took several minutes to clear the field of the frantic youths in red and white and the spectators." It seems most likely to me that the version of events where the ball was not blocked took place, as it would have been difficult to execute a 45-yard run had the ball been blocked around Bingham's 25 yard line, even if the ball was only partially blocked.

The excitement of the play was soon lost; A&M lost the ball on an offide play. Fortunately, Legrande lost 8 yards on his first carry, and only made up 1 yard on the second carry, forcing Winston to kick the ball for the Mebane boys again. Winston's kick went about 30 yards; Parker caught the ball for A&M and returned it around 10 yards. Person, Caserley, and Turner then combined to gain about 10 total yards to set up a 25-yard run by Caserley, reportedly the second-longest run of the game. Newton, Person, and Turner combined to advance the ball a combined 20 yards. The drive finished with a 10 yard run by Caserley for the touchdown; "again the red and white went wild." Person kicked the goal, and the Farmers were up 6-0.

Bingham's Winston kicked the ball off, and Turner this time intended to return. Turner fumbled the initial catch, but fell on the ball to maintain possession of the ball. After a few short gains, the A&M lost the ball on a fumble by Parker. Fortunately, the Black and Red could not do much with the ball. After another stalled drive that featured an 8 yard run by LeGrande as its crowning jewel, Winston kicked off again. Person caught the ball for the Red and White, returning the kick 10 yards. The last drive of the half featured multiple 5-10 yard runs by substitute Saddler, in addition to runs by Person, Caserley, and Turner. Time was called for the first half with the ball on Bingham's 20 yard line.

The second half opened with a kickoff of the main type seen in the day, from Winston to Person, who returned the kick about 8 yards. Newton and Saddler then advanced the ball another 18-19 yards. From there, Person punted the ball again; it was recovered by Mangum, who kicked the ball back towards the Farmers, the Red and White gaining 10 yards in the exchange. After about 20 yards of gains by Caserley and Person, A&M lost but recovered the ball on a fumble, and then continued marching down the field, with Caserley, Newton, and Saddler, driving about 40 yards in 6 runs. From there, Saddler ran the ball in 15 yards for a touchdown, and Person made the goal kick. The score then stood A&M, 12, Bingham, 0.

Winston booted another kickoff for Bingham, Newton reeling in the catch for 8 yards' gain. The A&M gained another 27 yards in runs by Newton and Caserley, including a 5 yard gain by Newton where he jumped over the line. At that point, A&M punted. The Morning Post wrote that Parker sent the ball away, but it is much more likely that the News and Observer again got the summary correct, and that Person, who had done all of the footwork for the Farmers to that point, kicked off. Winston caught the punt and was "stopped in his tracks" by either Caserley or Ramsey--descriptions of the game disagree as to which person made the tackle. LeGrande, King, and Clay all earned 0 or fewer yards from their efforts before Winston kicked to Newton, who advanced the ball for just 2 yards. The Farmers then drove the ball nearly 30 yards down the field, with runs by Saddler, Caserley, and Newton, before Turner fumbled the ball, where it was "nailed" by Smathers, of the Cadet team. After three plays by Johnston for a net gain of 5 yards, Winston kicked the ball away again, where it was caught by McKinnon, who returned the ball 10 yards. After a few more gains by the Farmers, Caserley fumbled the ball; it was recovered by Bingham. Winston immediately kicked the ball away 25 yards, but after an 8 yard return by McKinnon, Caserley ran the remainder of the distance for his second touchdown of the day. Perosn nailed his third straight goal kick, and the score became 18-0.

In the final kickoff of the game, Winston kicked the ball and Person returned the kick for 6 yards. In the dwindling minutes of the game, Newton made a beautiful 30-yard run (News and Observer, October 21st, 1899, p. 5; The (Raleigh) Morning Post, October 21st, 1899, p. 6).