SIKESTON — Young and old will once again head to the Sikeston Jaycee Bootheel Rodeo Grounds as the 78th Annual American Legion Cotton Carnival is just around the corner.
The Cotton Carnival will run from Sept. 27 through Oct. 1, with the annual Cotton Carnival parade to be held Oct. 1.
This year, the Cotton Carnival parade will feature the national commander of the American Legion Vincent J. Troiola.
“He’s going to be the parade marshal,” said Frankie Adams, commander of American Legion Post 114 in Sikeston. “We haven’t had a national commander here for the Cotton Carnival.”
The theme this year will be “Salute to the American Legion,” and there will be no changes to the parade route.
Once again, beginning at 10 a.m., the parade will start at the corner of Pine and Malone and continue west on Malone and finish in Downtown Sikeston, at the St. Francis Xavier Church.
One of the main draws of the Cotton Carnivals is the pageants.
The Little Mr. and Miss Cotton Carnival 2022 will be held at 7 p.m. Wednesday and is for any girl or boy from the area between ages of 4-6.
Junior Miss Sikeston, for any Sikeston freshman girl, will be held at 8 p.m. Thursday while Miss Cotton Carnival, open for area high school girls in grades 9-12 or Sikeston High School girls in grades 10-11, will be Saturday at 1:30 p.m.
The always popular Miss Sikeston, for senior Sikeston High School girls, will be held at 8 p.m. Saturday.
With no pageants scheduled for Friday night, the stage will feature live music with Countless Days set to perform.
The Cotton Carnival itself will begin Sept. 27 with wristbands $30 or regular coupons. On Wednesday and Thursday, all rides are regular coupons only with wristbands $30 on Friday night and Saturday from noon to 5 p.m. After 5 p.m. is regular coupons only.
The rides will once again be provided by Tinsley’s Amusements.
“We will have the smaller, juvenile section separated by all the food vendors from the larger kids so they don’t interfere and run over our smaller children,” Adams said. “We’ve done that in years past and it seems to work out well.”
There will be plenty of food vendors as well, including the American Legion selling their fish sandwiches both during the carnival and at lunch.
“We’re going to do lunch out there so they can drive by, get them and go,” Adams said.
But there will be plenty of other vendors including a donut trailer “Many Donuts,” Beggs Ice Cream and the Shriners with their funnel cakes and ribbon fries.
The Boy Scouts and Girl Scouts will each have trailers and the Sikeston Wrestling Club will be on hand selling their desserts as well as several local churches.
“It’s all coming together really nicely,” Adams said. “The community is really jumping in and helping. Without the community, we couldn’t make this happen.”