For more than 80 years, one south Alabama town has been home to the National Peanut Festival. These days, it also has more than 70 five-foot-tall pieces of peanut public art around town. Even so, most people do not know the real reason why Dothan, Alabama is the Peanut Capital of the World.
Dothan's ascent to peanut power began in the late 1910s after a boll weevil infestation destroyed most of the Wiregrass Region's cotton crops.
The area's agricultural land rebounded thanks to the work of famed botanist George Washington Carver, who taught at the Tuskegee Institute (now Tuskegee University) for 47 years. Carver is pictured here front and center at Tuskegee in 1902.
Carver taught many agricultural practices, like crop rotation to improve soil quality. He also was a pioneer in developing new uses for many crops, chief among them, peanuts. He came up with over 300 uses for them!
Much like the speed at which peanut seeds grow into plants (four months), Carver's ideas took hold in the region.
By the 1930s, peanut farming left cotton in the dust, overtaking it as the area's largest cash crop. In 1938, the city went ahead and claimed rights as "The Peanut Capital of the World." It's held up. According to the Alabama Farmers Federation, Dothan and surrounding areas produce about half of the nation's peanuts.
The Dothan community held a giant festival that year, where Carver spoke to a crowd of over 6,000, according to The Encyclopedia of Alabama. That three-day harvest festival grew into the National Peanut Festival, which continues today.
The National Peanut Festival grew into a 10-day affair with over 200,000 attendees and includes events throughout the community, including a huge parade downtown that's full of peanutty pageantry.
People come from far and wide to experience agricultural expositions and competitions, socialize, munch on boiled peanuts and other fair foods, and take endlessly entertaining selfies around the grounds.
The festival features music, car and truck shows, a demo derby, arts and crafts, and a massive midway of daring rides and games.
If you'd like to get away to Dothan for a beautiful retreat with a rural feel and proximity to the city, check out Juju’s Pond House on Smith Pond. The highly rated vacation rental is situated on 100 acres with a small pond available for catch-and-release fishing, kayaking, and paddle boarding. Besides that, relaxing on the porch watching a Deep South country sunset seems good enough for me.
You can get all the details about the next festival's calendar of events on the National Peanut Festival website and keep up with its latest news on the National Peanut Festival Facebook page.
Have you ever visited Dothan for the National Peanut Festival or otherwise? Drop us a line and let us know about your time in the Wiregrass. Now you know why Dothan is the Peanut Capital of the World, we hope you'll give a little thanks to our farmers every time you have a perfect PBJ or peanut butter cup.
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