City of Red Bay gears up for annual Founders Fest

The annual Red Bay Founders Fest is set for Sept. 15 in Bay Tree Park, with all of the usual contests, sidewalk sales and live music. This year there will be new feature, however, highlighting another portion of Red Bay’s history.

For the first time in the history of Red Bay’s Founders Fest, Native Americans will be in attendance to dance, demonstrate and talk about their heritage. Festival coordinators said this provides a tie-in with Alabama’s Bicentennial, as Native Americans were the first settlers in the state of Alabama and the country.

Those who will be performing are coming from Oklahoma and Mississippi.

Founders Fest will also feature a presentation on Native American culture by Rickey Butch Walker in the senior citizens building.

The day-long event kicks off with the Queen’s Train Ride at 8:30 a.m. with the beauty pageant winners, and live music cranks up at 9 a.m. A variety of contests invite festival-goers’ participation, including a buck dancing contest, quilt contest, coloring contest, photography contest, fiddling contest, corn hole tournament and barbecue cook-off.

A contest will also be held to see who has the best fried pies. The categories are best tasting, most unusual and best decorated.

Additional activities include arts and crafts and an antique car, truck, motorcycle and tractor show. There will be giveaways, and prizes will be awarded to the largest family, longest distance traveled to the event and the youngest and oldest attendees.

The Red Bay Museum will be open free of charge from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Many new items have been added in the past year, as well as just in the past few months, including a filing system from Red Bay Post Office used in the 1920s, a large ornate mirror, new Tammy Wynette items, a wire egg crate from Pore Boy Egg Farms located in Red Bay in the 1960s and items associated with former congressman and Profile in Courage winner Carl Elliott, who was originally from Vina.