That's an interesting history. Reunions do not have to be a horrible burden on the host, beyond the planning and preparation. If the family is so physically dispersed that they need to spend days together, then flights and hotels and incidentals are an obvious cost and will always limit those who cannot take off the time or have the money to bring kids and the whole family.
Reunions really were an annual thing for families when the country was more agricultural and the majority of the cousins and siblings lived relatively close, often no more than a days drive by wagon or train or car.
My mother's father's line had such a reunion, and my branch of the family often hosted. Most of the members came from within the same county. Even though their children went to the same little two-room school back in the day, that didn't mean the family gathered at any one time without a reunion. By the time I came along, they were no longer being held, but the more distant family several counties over still had one, and we sometimes attended, but we didn't really know those distant cousins, so it did not feel very close bonded.
There was no burden really for the local reunion in the same county. There would have been no "entertainment" and any expectation of it would have been viewed as alien to family, as there would be no obligation of a host to entertain guests beyond feeding and, if possible, putting up those who needed to stay over and sleep. However, I have no doubt that the children played games together and that there was some singing as a group or quartets, and unquestionably, horseshoe throwing.
Reunions were one-day affairs, and potlucks, so everyone broad big amounts of food to share. Most wives did not work outside the home, so cooking like that was a point of pride, especially for family.
Family has infamously become more fragmented as it dispersed in America. It's not much fun to gather with distant branches of the family when there are no shared stories, or sense of place, or common bonds.
Just yesterday, I contacted my uncle to get a first cousin's phone number. I wanted to share some genealogy information I just leaned, and thought my first cousin once removed may have some information inherited from our common grandmother/great-grandmother. It was a sad request.
I asked for it by calling my uncle on Wednesday. He remembered to send it to me Thursday, by text, but added that the number seemed to no longer work. He then later said it did, and the cousin returned his call. My intent was to call him and get his brother's contact information, the one who likely had the family papers. That younger brother died earlier this year, and his widow did not even contact her husband's only brother. He learned about it months later when someone contacted him with condolence. There was no funeral, no obituary, no nothing. The deceased cousin has twin sons, aged 40, but neither of them told anyone either. It's depressing to learn that family can be so isolated.
On a positive not, my cousin did call and we did talk about 30 minutes, but it is the last remnants of any connection to my maternal grandfather's only sibling.
