The 41st annual Mississippi Watermelon Festival will be held at Mize City Park on Friday - Saturday, July 19-20. However, the two-day fun for everyone is more than just a celebration of the sweet, juicy fruit.
Smith County Watermelons
Terresa Stewart, the festival’s director and Mize Volunteer Fire Department assistant chief, sees the benefits from both sides – the festival fun and the fire department fundraiser.
“We have a little bit of everything,” she said. “It’s a lot of fun, and we have something for everybody.”
However, the enlarged children’s play area, the 80-plus vendor spaces, the food vendors, the live entertainment, and the various watermelon games all contribute to the Mize Volunteer Fire Department.
The Mize High School Band will play the National Anthem.
“I do want to stress that this is a nonprofit that is a fundraiser by the Mize Volunteer Fire Department, and we are a total volunteer staff,” she said.
Nobody gets paid; everyone is a volunteer. All the proceeds from this event go to support the fire department.
“We’re fortunate as a fire department that we have this kind of fundraiser, and we have a great group of young people who were heading this department and driving it, and they’re really great. I can’t say enough good things about the department; they’re just wonderful to work for you.”
Stewart said a $10 armband lets the smaller children play all day in the inflatable area.
“They buy the $10 armband and they can go up and down around about all day,” she said. “We usually have five or six different things in that area. This year, we are also adding a little barrel train running in that area, so children will be included in that.”
For the older children, the festival offers games like the bull, the bungee jump, and the rock wall.
Admission is $5 for adults on Friday beginning at 3:30 p.m. and $3 for children younger than 10. On Saturday starting at 8:30 a.m., admission is $10 for adults and $5 for children under 10, and that includes the concert.
Gospel music returns Friday night with Waco Church of God starting at around 6:30 p.m., and followed by The 9th Hour Band from Purvis at 7:30 p.m.
There will be a 5K Run on Saturday morning.
Saturday’s activities include the early-morning 5K run, watermelon games, and the concert that night by the Lacs, Dirt Rock performers Clay “Uncle Snap” Sharpe and Brian “Rooster” King.
Saturday, however, is devoted to the watermelon.
Everyone loves watermelon!
“How can you not like watermelon, right?” said Stewart. The most popular watermelon game is the watermelon eating contest. “Everybody likes to get in on that. The only bad thing is if you eat too much.”
Live entertainment begins Saturday morning at 9, Stewart said.
“We’ll have a high school band play the national anthem, and then we’ll have country music Saturday,” she said. “At noon, we do our biggest watermelon contest and announce the winners of that, and then the stage will close so that we can set up our concert that night.”
The Lacs take the stage at 8 p.m., Stewart said.
The LACS will be peforming in Mize on Saturday.
“They are great, really popular with young people, so we’re excited to be bringing them in and giving our young people something,” she said. “We have brought a lot of older artists in already, and this year we wanted to do something for our younger people.”
Another highlight of the festival will be the appearance by Mike Cockrell of Mize from the Discovery Channel show “Moonshiners.”
“He’s going to be set up talking to people, signing autographs and taking pictures,” Stewart said. “We’re looking forward to that because we all know him and he has a lot of fans in this area too.”
In addition to the annual car/truck/wagon show, the Watermelon Festival will have a tractor show this year.
Great Car Show!
“It is a separate tractor show that Mississippi International Tractor Club is doing – a big display of tractors. Andy Gipson, the Agriculture Commissioner, has been invited to attend especially to do our biggest watermelon contest.”
The Watermelon Festival has drawn as many as 8,000 people over the two days. In April, Chelbi Sheffield was crowned Miss Watermelon Queen. She received a scholarship of $1,000 to the college of her choice. She receives an expense allowance for traveling around the state and promoting the watermelon business.
It's all about the melons and fun!