September 26th and 27th, 2008

In 1995, Downtown Columbia Business & Professional Association conceived the Fall Festival with the goal of bringing a higher awareness of downtown to the community. Over the years the festival has become an anticipated annual event for the community.  

In 2004, the association decided it was time for the event to step up a notch. To do this, the Saturday night entertainment went from local entertainers to a top recording group from the past, The Drifters. Attendance to the two day festival soared to approximately eight thousand.  

With the success of the 2004 festival and looking forward to Columbia’s projected growth of the near future, the association moved the festival to the next level in 2005. The festival was reborn as the Southern Fried Fall Festival with big name entertainment, a Recipe/Cook-off contest, Dessert Sampling area and much more. The goal was to draw not only the local community to downtown Columbia, but also people from all of Middle Tennessee.  The goal was accomplished with a crowd near ten thousand for the two day event.

The Southern Fried Festival continues to grow bigger and better each year. The two main attractions continue to be top notch entertainment and scrumptious foods.

The phrase “Southern Fried” brings images of an abundance of wonderful foods to mind and starts your taste buds tingling. Food events will be everywhere. Food vendors will feature such “Southern Fried” favorites as, fried chicken, fried green tomatoes, fried pickles, fried Twinkees, Oreos, Snickers and much, much more. Local cooks will compete in a southern fried food cook-off and there will be cooking demonstrations as well. The People’s Table Dessert Tasting Alley will give attendees an opportunity to sample some of the south’s best desserts. The First United Methodist Church will have a Pancake Breakfast on Saturday morning. No one should leave hungry!

This year the festival will include a carnival sponsored by the Columbia Fire Fighters Association. North Main Street will be lined with an Antique Tractor show and an Antique Trunk Sale sponsored by the Maury County Antique Association. 

The Southern Fried Festival should draw record crowds to downtown Columbia in 2008 and only continue to grow in the future.