On October , , the small town of Weiner, Arkansas will gather a large crowd on their streets. We will be celebrating the year of the Arkansas Rice Festival. People travel from all over the U.S. on the second weekend in October to visit friends, have reunions, and just have a lot of fun in Weiner. We have entertainment, contests, food, crafts, and share lots of memories of days gone by.

In October of 1976, people gathered for the first annual Arkansas Rice Festival. A group of folks in this busy little town and some surrounding areas, decided it was time to celebrate what we were all about........Rice Farming. Rice has a direct impact on everyone in this area. You either farm, work at the rice mill, or work at some type of grain or fertilizer industry. Without it, none of us would survive in this area.

The state of Arkansas produces more rice than anyone else in the whole USA. In fact, Arkansas produces around 50% of the total of rice production. In our area, Poinsett County, we are almost always the top producing county in the state. Now that is an amazing and an exciting thing to celebrate!

Come see how rice was threshed in the earlier days. Farmers didn't have big tractors and combines that we now have. There will be a demonstration showing you just how this was done. The stories and demonstrations are part of the celebration and history of the Arkansas Rice Festival, as well as learning how we harvest rice today with new equipment and technology available to us.

Come on out and help us celebrate on the second weekend of October.

Threshing rice at the Arkansas Rice Festival 2009 with the 1946 Keck-Gonnerman Rice Special and a 1951 M Farmall. It had been very wet and turned cold that day. The thresher and M Farmall belong to Franklin Horst who is on the tractor. Buddy Schwarz is sewing sacks and Sonny Wolfe and Billy Joe Adams are on the bagger.

Threshing rice as it would have looked in the mid-1940's. There would probably have been a wagon or sled on each side of the thresher, and men would have been pitching from both sides. The pace would have been alot faster and the model D would have probably been running wide open. Sometimes, they would pitch up by hand off of the sleds or "mud boats" in a wet fall, and usually pitch bundles until they couldn't lift their arms!

Threshing rice at the Arkansas Rice Festival 2010. We had a little trouble with the belts on the threshing machine, so it looks like a lot of people are intently staring at the separator. The beautiful M Farmall and the Keck-Gonnerman Rice Special Thresher belong to Franklin Horst.

A few of the old tractors at the Arkansas Rice Festival including a 1947 John Deere Model D LP Conversion, a Minneapolis-Moline used in the movie "A Painted House" and some beautiful Allis-Chalmers