Marion County's Beloved National Cornbread Festival Returns in April
Returning for the first time since 2019, the National Cornbread Festival will be held April 23-24 in South Pittsburg. The festival will be 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Saturday and 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Sunday. There will be something for everybody at the festival, including a Lodge Cast Iron cornbread cook-off, cornbread samples in Cornbread Alley, live music, handmade art vendors, a 5K race, carnival rides, a fondo bike race, a cornbread eating contest, and more.
There will be four stages with activities and live music going on throughout both days. Ben Haggard, country music artist and son of Merle Haggard, will headline the festival along with TikTok-viral country singer Hannah Dasher, bluegrass artist Rhonda Vincent, and East Tennessee singer-songwriter Corey Layne.
Twenty-five years ago, the National Cornbread Festival started as an idea to try to get more people to visit South Pittsburg. At the time, a highway was being built, and the residents didn’t want people to just drive down the road without stopping to see what the beautiful town of South Pittsburg and its people had to offer. The first annual festival was a success in 1997, and the rest is history.
“This is a very social place, and people love to do things together,” festival president Beth Duggar said. “There’s a strong volunteer spirit in the people that live here, and we wanted to have something like a festival to bring people to the area. Because of the South and the Lodge Cast Iron factory, it just made sense to have a cornbread festival.”
South Pittsburg’s strong sense of volunteerism is displayed by over 350+ community volunteers of all ages helping to put on the festival every year. Volunteers start prepping as early as eight months before, and over 15 committees plan and execute all of the moving parts surrounding the festival. Typically, thousands of people come to South Pittsburg to eat cornbread and participate in all of the activities.
“This is a great way to get out, have fun, and take advantage of everything that we offer,” Beth Duggar said. “When you come here, you get the feeling you’re being welcomed into somebody’s yard because it’s such a friendly place. We always say, ‘Come see what’s cooking in South Pittsburg.’”
Single day tickets and two day passes can be purchased on Eventbrite. Proceeds are distributed throughout the community to help with improvement projects in the area including restoring historical buildings and streets, supporting schools and daycares, donating to theaters and libraries, and more.