Wilcox County Alabama Triple “B” Reunion Festival
In the first weekend of October 2015, Camden, Alabama, hosted a three-day gathering that blended a school reunion, a barbecue contest, a blues show and a Sunday gospel celebration into a single programme. The event was billed on its event page as the Wilcox County Triple “B” Reunion Festival, and its own description line added a second, equally honest name: “Wilcox County Alumni BBQ and Blues Festival with Praise in the Park on Sunday”. Those two name layers sit side by side in the record and were never presented as one merged billing, so this article keeps them separate too. What follows describes the one edition that is fully documented anywhere — Friday, October 2 to Sunday, October 4, 2015 — because no source found attests any other year, before or since.
About
The Triple “B” Reunion Festival was an alumni-centred reunion event held in Camden, the county seat of Wilcox County in Alabama’s Black Belt region. Its identity balanced three strands that the “B” branding gestured toward: barbecue, blues and the fellowship of a homecoming weekend, rounded out on Sunday by Praise in the Park, a gospel gathering built into the same programme. The reunion framing was not decoration. Alumni were invited to sign their class up for the Saturday parade, which made the event as much about former classmates returning to Camden as about the food and music on offer.
Being straight about the limits of the evidence matters with an event like this one. The event page that documents this festival names no organiser of record, and it covers a single edition only, with no hint of what came before it or after. One segment sponsor is documented: the “1000 Boys in the Park” segment was sponsored in part by BAMA Kids, Inc. Road to Manhood Program, through support from the Black Belt Community Foundation and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. BAMA Kids, Inc. is a real Camden youth nonprofit — its name expands to Better Activities Makes All-Around Kids, and it began in 1993 — but the record credits it only with that segment, so it must not be promoted into the festival’s organiser. Sunday’s programme host was billed as “Midday Praise Harold Jay”, exactly as published.
Quick Facts
| Item | Detail |
| Documented edition | Friday, October 2 to Sunday, October 4, 2015 — the only edition attested in any source found |
| Event page title | Wilcox County Triple “B” Reunion Festival |
| Description-layer name | Wilcox County Alumni BBQ and Blues Festival, with Praise in the Park on Sunday |
| Host town | Camden, Alabama, the county seat of Wilcox County |
| Venue | Camden Municipal Airport Ball Park, Camden, Alabama (no street address published) |
| Organiser | None named on the event page |
| Adult admission (2015) | Weekend pass twenty-five dollars, or one-day pass fifteen dollars |
| Child admission (2015) | Free |
| Saturday highlights | Alumni parade, People’s Choice BBQ Cook-off, car show, horse show, Kids Fun Zone |
| Sunday programme | Praise in the Park, with gospel music and the “1000 Boys in the Park” segment |
History
The documented history of this festival is deliberately short, because the evidence is short. A single event page, published through an event-ticketing platform, preserves the full shape of the October 2015 weekend: its dates, its venue, its admission prices and its day-by-day programme. Nothing found in research for this article confirms an earlier edition, and nothing confirms that the festival returned in any later year. Any account that presented the Triple “B” Reunion Festival as a long-running annual tradition would be inventing a past the sources do not support.
What the record does show is a town with deep roots for such a homecoming. Camden was incorporated in 1841, after the Wilcox County seat was moved from Canton Bend on the Alabama River in 1833, according to the Wilcox Area Chamber of Commerce’s history page. A county seat town of that age, drawing generations of families through its schools, is exactly the kind of place where an alumni reunion weekend makes sense: the parade invitation was aimed at classes, not just individuals, and the Sunday programme set an explicit goal of bringing more than two thousand boys and girls into the park. The festival’s documented life may be one weekend, but it grew out of a community structure — school classes, churches, riding groups and a youth nonprofit — that is plainly much older.
For a useful comparison, see the Washington County Alabama Frankville Old Time Fiddlers Festival for another county festival.
What to Expect
Because only the 2015 edition is documented, this section describes that weekend as published, day by day, rather than promising what any future visitor would find.
Friday opened with a Tailgate Party and Blues Show, with gates opening at 3:00 p.m. and the evening reserved for adults only. That adults-only note is worth underlining: the opening night was pitched at grown-up reunion socialising, while the family programming was concentrated on Saturday and Sunday.
Saturday was the fullest day. The festival kicked off with the alumnus parade at 11:00 a.m., with alumni invited to sign their class up to take part. The People’s Choice BBQ Cook-off carried one thousand five hundred dollars in cash prizes, putting the judging partly in the hands of the crowd. A car show featured the Wilcox Riders, with cash prizes in each category, and a horse show featured the Extreme Riders of Gees Bend. Families were covered by a Kids Fun Zone with bouncers, a game room and more. Live music came from Kaitlin Hill, billed on the page as “the 15 year old music sensation”, and the day also included a segment called “Apollo in the Park”.
Sunday belonged to Praise in the Park. Gates opened at 2:00 p.m. and the programme began at 4:00 p.m., with gospel music from over twelve gospel groups and entertainers, alongside motivational speakers. The “1000 Boys in the Park” segment, sponsored in part as described above, sat inside this Sunday programme, and the page stated a goal of getting over two thousand boys and girls into the park that day.
Planning Your Visit
Anyone researching this festival today should begin from the honest position: the October 2015 weekend is the only edition with a published record, and no later edition has been verified. Treat the details in this article as a faithful account of that documented weekend, not as a standing annual listing. If a future edition is ever announced, its dates, prices and programme would need to be confirmed from that announcement itself, because nothing here can be assumed to carry forward.
For the 2015 weekend as published, the practical picture was straightforward. The venue was the Camden Municipal Airport Ball Park in Camden, Alabama; no street address was published, so visitors relied on local knowledge of the ball park grounds. Adults could choose between a weekend pass at twenty-five dollars and a one-day pass at fifteen dollars, while children were admitted free. Friday’s tailgate and blues show was adults only, so families with children were best served by the Saturday programme — parade, cook-off, shows and the Kids Fun Zone — and by Sunday afternoon’s Praise in the Park. Alumni travelling back to Camden had the extra step of signing their class up for the parade, which the event page invited them to do.
A Sample Itinerary for the Documented Weekend
Friday: arrive in Camden during the afternoon, settle in, and head to the Camden Municipal Airport Ball Park for the 3:00 p.m. gate opening. Spend the evening at the Tailgate Party and Blues Show, reconnecting with classmates in the adults-only opening session.
Saturday: be in place before the 11:00 a.m. alumnus parade, especially if your class is marching. Graze the People’s Choice BBQ Cook-off entries through the middle of the day and cast your vote, then split the afternoon between the Wilcox Riders car show, the Extreme Riders of Gees Bend horse show and the live music, while children rotate through the Kids Fun Zone.
Sunday: take a slow morning, then return to the ball park when gates open at 2:00 p.m. Settle in before the 4:00 p.m. Praise in the Park programme, with its dozen-plus gospel groups, motivational speakers and the “1000 Boys in the Park” segment, and let the weekend close on that communal note.
How It Compares
Most festival write-ups can lean on a run of editions, comparing one year against the last. This one cannot, and that is its defining feature. Where a typical county fair or music festival page describes a standing attraction with a predictable season, the Triple “B” Reunion Festival survives in the record as a single, unusually complete snapshot: dates, prices, venue and a full three-day programme, all preserved on one event page, with silence on either side of it.
Its blend is also distinctive. Barbecue cook-offs and car shows are common festival furniture, but the combination here — an alumni class parade, a youth-focused Sunday gospel programme with a named segment sponsor, a horse show from Gees Bend riders and an adults-only blues tailgate to open — reflects a reunion first and a festival second. The centre of gravity was people who had left Camden coming back to it, which separates this event from commercially pitched festivals aimed at general tourists.
Planning Checklist
- Confirm whether any new edition has actually been announced before making travel plans; only the 2015 weekend is verified
- Note the documented dates as historical: Friday, October 2 to Sunday, October 4, 2015
- Remember the venue as published: Camden Municipal Airport Ball Park, Camden, Alabama, with no street address in the record
- Budget from the 2015 prices only as history: twenty-five dollars for an adult weekend pass, fifteen dollars for a day pass, children free
- Treat Friday’s tailgate and blues show as adults only, as billed in 2015
- If you are an alumnus, note that the 2015 page invited classes to sign up for the Saturday parade
- Keep the Saturday anchors in mind: parade at 11:00 a.m., cook-off, car show and horse show through the day
- Allow Sunday afternoon for Praise in the Park, gates at 2:00 p.m. and programme at 4:00 p.m.
- Do not assume any of the 2015 details — prices, performers or programme — apply to any other year
Beyond the Ball Park
A reunion weekend in Camden naturally extends past the festival grounds. Camden is a small county seat town in Wilcox County, in the Black Belt country along the Alabama River, and the chamber of commerce history that anchors this article reaches back to the seat’s move from Canton Bend in 1833 and the town’s incorporation in 1841. Visitors drawn by the 2015 programme would also have encountered the wider world the programme itself referenced: Gees Bend, whose riders appeared in the horse show, carries a celebrated quilting heritage, and the youth work represented by BAMA Kids, Inc. has been part of Camden life since 1993. Even where the festival record falls silent, the community that produced it remains documented and visitable on its own terms.
Why This Weekend Mattered
A single documented edition can still carry real significance. The 2015 Triple “B” Reunion Festival shows a small Black Belt county seat staging an ambitious, self-organised homecoming: competitive barbecue with serious prize money, organised riding and car communities, a platform for a fifteen-year-old singer, and a Sunday programme that deliberately centred young people, with a stated ambition of filling the park with more than two thousand boys and girls. The involvement of a local youth nonprofit, a regional community foundation and a national foundation in one segment shows the event was plugged into serious support networks, not improvised in isolation. Preserving its details accurately — including the limits of what is known — keeps that achievement visible.
Frequently Asked Questions
Was the Triple “B” Reunion Festival an annual event in Camden?
No source found confirms that. Only one edition is documented anywhere: the weekend of Friday, October 2 to Sunday, October 4, 2015. Nothing attests an earlier or later year, so the festival cannot honestly be described as annual, current or upcoming.
Which name is the right one, Triple “B” Reunion or Alumni BBQ and Blues?
Both appear in the record as separate layers. The event page’s title was “Wilcox County Triple “B” Reunion Festival”, while its own description line read “Wilcox County Alumni BBQ and Blues Festival with Praise in the Park on Sunday”. They are recorded unmerged, because the page itself never fused them into a single billing.
Who organised the festival?
The event page names no organiser of record, and this article does not invent one. The only organisational credit published concerns one segment: the “1000 Boys in the Park” segment was sponsored in part by BAMA Kids, Inc. Road to Manhood Program, through support from the Black Belt Community Foundation and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. A segment sponsor is not the festival organiser.
What happened on each day of the 2015 weekend?
Friday brought a Tailgate Party and Blues Show, gates at 3:00 p.m., adults only. Saturday opened with the alumnus parade at 11:00 a.m., followed by the People’s Choice BBQ Cook-off, the Wilcox Riders car show, the Extreme Riders of Gees Bend horse show, the Kids Fun Zone, live music and “Apollo in the Park”. Sunday closed with Praise in the Park, gates at 2:00 p.m. and programme at 4:00 p.m.
What to Expect From the Next Wilcox County Alabama Triple “B” Reunion Festival
How often is Wilcox County Alabama Triple “B” Reunion Festival held?
No reliable answer exists. A single edition, in October 2015, is the whole of the documented record, and no source establishes a yearly cycle or any other rhythm. Describing a frequency would require evidence that has not been found.
When is the next Wilcox County Alabama Triple “B” Reunion Festival?
No next edition is documented or verified. If organisers ever stage the festival again, the announcement for that edition would be the only trustworthy source for its dates, and it should be checked directly rather than inferred from the 2015 weekend.
Will the dates change?
There are no standing dates to change. The only dates attached to this festival are October 2 to 4, 2015. Any future edition would set its own dates, and there is no verified pattern from which to predict them.
The Triple “B” Reunion Festival endures in the record as one richly detailed Camden weekend: barbecue smoke and blues on Friday, a class-parade homecoming on Saturday, and a park full of gospel on Sunday. Telling its story exactly as documented — one edition, honestly bounded — honours both the people who staged it and the readers who deserve facts rather than a legend built on silence.
