2021 Hope Watermelon Festival
Click
here to buy tickets for The 40th Annual Hope Watermelon Festival Concert featuring
legendary headline act THE OAK RIDGE BOYS on Saturday, August 13th at the outdoor
Amphitheater in Fair Park. Opening Act 2021 Miss America, Betty Cantrell will take the
stage at 7:30 p.m. followed by THE OAK RIDGE BOYS at 8:30 p.m. Gates open at 6:00 p.m.
Hope Fair Park CMC Stage.
For more information 870-722-8516.
OUR SPONSORS
Airgas Mid South
ASAP Finance
Atwood's
Elliott Electric Supply
The Home Depot
Hempstead County EDC
FESTIVAL SCHEDULE / BROCHURE

Brochure
Watermelon Festival Car Show Flyer and Entry Form
Page 1
Page 2
2021 Motorcycle Show Info
Download Flyer Info Sheet
2021 Little Miss Watermelon
Arm Wrestling
Download Info Sheet

HISTORY OF THE HOPE WATERMELON FESTIVAL
Watermelons have
long
been a calling card for the City of Hope. The
Festival itself dates back to the mid-1920's when
the city's Chamber of Commerce staged a one-day
Festival each year. The early Watermelon Festivals
bear little resemblance to the recent ones. During
the 1920's-era festivals, citizens served ice-cold
watermelon to passengers on the many trains which
stopped in Hope. The festival also featured a
"Watermelon Queen" pageant and a large parade. These
early festivals brought upwards of 20,000 people in
a day to Hope. The end to the first festivals came
about 1931 when the city, suffering from the effects
of the depression, could no longer accommodate the
crowds.
Hope celebrated its centennial
in 1975. The event was a rousing success and local residents
started thinking about another celebration. Local promoter
and newspaper man C.M. "Pod" Rogers organized a new
Watermelon Festival in 1977. The success of this first
reorganized festival led to the event gaining annual status.
Since the 1970's, the festival has continued to grow,
attracting approximately 50,000 visitors to Hope over a
four-day period.
The modern day Hope
Watermelon festival features numerous activities
including Arts & Crafts, food, entertainment and other
family-oriented activities. Nearly 300 Arts and Crafts
booths will be set up at the festival grounds.
The Arts and Crafts come from a 6 state area. The
festival
also features dozens of food booths, serving everything
from burgers and corn dogs to pork rinds and
"chicken-on-a-stick".
Local civic clubs
also
hold dinners featuring such down-home fare as
locally grown smoked chicken and golden fried
catfish. The Watermelon Festival features a variety
of musical talent each year. What else can you do at the festival?
You can participate in a 5K race, take in a dog
show, enter the "Watermelon Idol" talent contest or
play "hillbilly horseshoes".
The Watermelon
Olympics
will also be held, pitting local teams against each
other in such events as the melon-toss. There's also
an antique car show, an antique engine show
featuring old steam engines, and a volleyball
tournament. The festival also features a number of
melon-oriented events such as the seed-spitting
contest and the Watermelon eating contest And what
of the famous Hope melons? Those attending will be
able to see some of the bigger specimens of the
year, some tipping the scales at close to 200 pounds.
Ice-cold watermelon will be sold by the slice for
$1.25 each day and numerous melon growers will have
whole melons on sale at the festival for visitors to
take home.

World Champion Melon Grower
Ivan Bright
Just because the
Watermelon Festival ended in 1930 didn't mean an end
to the actual growing of the melons in
Hempstead County, Arkansas. A local farmer
named O.D. Middlebrooks of the Patmos
Community near Hope produced a 195 pound
melon in 1935. The record stood for 44 years
until Ivan and Lloyd Bright produced a 200
pound melon in 1979. The Bright family grew
a second world's record watermelon in 1985. The melon weighed in at 260
pounds and held the world's record
(according to Guinness) for several years
until a 262 pound melon grown in Tennessee
took top honors.
2021 brought a severe drought which
caused southwest Arkansas farmers much
grief. One notable exception was the
watermelon farmers. The drought meant
sweeter melons for the producers of table
melons. The drought also allowed Lloyd
Bright to better control the moisture he
delivered to his melons. This allowed
for a larger than usual crop of giant
melons. Word got out in late summer
Bright might have another record.
Immediately following the Watermelon
Festival of 2021, Bright alerted the Chamber of Commerce of the
possibility of an exceptional melon in his
patch. On Labor Day week-end, a group of
family, friends, and media met in the Bright
patch to pick that melon. It was taken to
the Farm Store in Hope and weighed on
certified scales. The entire process was
documented and the melon was certified at
268.8 pounds. In spring 2006, the Guinness
Book of World Records certified Lloyd Bright's 268.8 pound melon as the
world's
largest.

View several pictures from the Hope Watermelon Festival in the
1920's at
giantwatermelons.com.
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