The good people of the Climax Community Club will be celebrating their 35th annual Swine Time Festival today.

In the festival’s 35-year history, the club has hosted many distinguished grand marshals ranging from Bainbridge and Decatur County’s own late former Georgia Gov. Marvin Griffin and Bainbridge’s Georgia Secretary of State Cathy Cox, to U.S. Rep. Sanford Bishop and the mayors of Climax.

The grand marshal for this year’s Swine Time is Jones Country Meats, a 29-year Climax business.

Community Club Presidents Clifford Wells, who led the club 35 years ago, and Charles Hadsock, who leads it today, and all the other presidents through the years, have personally seen to it that the festival has gotten better and better each year.

Special Swine Time guests through the years have included former Georgia Gov. Joe Frank Harris, and Climax’s own major league baseball player Earnie Riles, a former U.S.A. Today rookie of the year with the Milwaukee Brewers.

Swine Time guests have competed in many hog-related contests ranging from hog calling, to chitterlings eating. For many years, Lake Seminole sage Jack Wingate entertained the crowds as chitterlings eating contest master of ceremonies.

During the 1994 flood, U.S. Army National Guard and reservists stayed at the Climax Depot on the Swine Time grounds while assisting flood victims. The next year, they were brought back as Swine Time grand marshals.

Swine Time is a special event. Come on over to Climax and enjoy it.