By Brady Talbert / Staff Writer

COLUMBIANA – Main street was bustling with vendors, food and entertainment June 29-30 with the city celebrating its 32^nd annual Liberty Day Celebration.

This year’s Liberty Day featured nearly 100 vendors providing goods like food and clothing, Columbiana Mayor Stancil Handely said. The celebration featured events geared toward families, like the new hot dog eating contest and automotive show.

Columbiana’s Liberty Day was first hosted back in summer 1986, after a group of locals created the celebration to honor the 100-year anniversary of the Statue of Liberty in New York Harbor, which was rededicated July 4, 1986. The day has since become a tradition for the city, one that has “gained momentum” over the years, since becoming the city’s “largest event” according to Handley.

It is “one more opportunity for us to congregate as friends, neighbors and as a community,” Handley stated, adding that the city is “working hard” to bring back the sociability of downtown. Long term, the mayor hopes to see Columbiana transform into an entertainment destination for central Alabama, providing a place more people to “mix and mingle.”

Handely said he appreciates how the event has “morphed” to not only celebrating citizens’ freedoms, but also active and retired military. It’s simply a day to “celebrate our liberty,” he said.

See all photos from this years event here.