The 42nd Tomato Fest brought thousands of people to downtown Jacksonville Saturday as the city celebrated its famous fruit. Many came from beyond Jacksonville to join the festivities.<\/p>\n
Crystal Bullock and Katelyn Scott, from the Chandler area, said they were visiting Jacksonville solely for the Tomato Fest. Scott said a co-worker had informed her of the festival and encouraged her to go, so the two began planning a trip to attend.<\/p>\n
Katelyn Scott and Crystal Bullock drove from the Chandler area to visit Jacksonville’s Tomato Fest.jpg<\/p>\n
Katelyn Scott and Crystal Bullock came from the Chandler area to visit Jacksonville’s Tomato Fest.<\/p>\n
Scott said she was glad they made the trip and both ladies said the Tomato Fest was better than they anticipated.<\/p>\n
Bullock said she wondered what there would be to do at a Tomato Fest, but followed that with, \u201cApparently everything.\u201d<\/p>\n
Scott added that the people at the festival were “so nice.”<\/p>\n
Alexa Haushalter 1.JPG<\/p>\n
Alexa Haushalter, of Austin, visited Tomato Fest for the first time Saturday, winning the tomato peeling contest with the most cleanly peeled tomato (and cleanest plate).<\/p>\n
Another out-of-town visitor was Alexa Haushalter from Austin. Saturday was her first visit to the Tomato Fest. She participated in both the tomato eating and tomato peeling contests, winning the latter.<\/p>\n
\u201cI love tomatoes,\u201d Haushalter said after her win. \u201cIt\u2019s my favorite food.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cherokee County Commissioner Kelly Traylor reclaimed his title in the tomato eating contest, but only after an eat-off against news anchor Brannon Gurley. A tie had been declared between the two after the initial round with 12 contestants.<\/p>\n
Kelly Traylor 1.JPG<\/p>\n
Kelly Traylor regained his title, winning the Celebrity Tomato Eating Contest after tying in the initial round and competing in an eat-off.<\/p>\n
The festival was filled with activities such as other tomato-related contests, the annual car and motorcycle shows, the Kids Zone and talent contests. Live entertainment was provided and there were hundreds of booths including businesses, non-profit organizations, churches, a farmer\u2019s market and food vendors.<\/p>\n
The Vanishing Texana Museum opened during Tomato Fest, as did many downtown businesses and eateries.<\/p>\n
The Jacksonville Soccer Association hosted its 33rd Tomato Fest Tournament.<\/p>\n
The annual Tomato Fest is set for the second Saturday of June each year. So if you missed this one \u2013 or want to come again \u2013 mark your calendars for next year.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 42nd Tomato Fest brought thousands of people to downtown Jacksonville Saturday as the city celebrated its famous…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":242601,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[129238,129237,116,118,117,129236],"class_list":["post-309863","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-jacksonville","tag-alexa-haushalter","tag-crystal-bullock","tag-jacksonville","tag-jacksonville-headlines","tag-jacksonville-news","tag-katelyn-scott"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309863","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=309863"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/309863\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/242601"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=309863"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=309863"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=309863"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}