Hog Day comes to Hillsborough

Hillsborough brought home the bacon with the 34th annual Hog Day festival Friday and Saturday.

After being held in Efland for the past two years, Orange County’s biggest and longest-running festival has returned to downtown Hillsborough.

Craig Lloyd, a festival planner, said Hog Day was originally created as a way to gather the community. Hog Day was managed and run by the Town of Hillsborough Chamber of Commerce up until three years ago, when they were planning on ending the festival. The Orange County Optimist Club was then created and took over the planning for Hog Day. The Optimist Club is a local nonprofit organization formed in 2014 to contribute funding to local youth organizations in Orange County.

Lloyd is now the president of the Optimist Club.

“We’re 100 percent volunteer led, we don’t have any overhead, no employees,” Lloyd said. “All the money would go into grants that we give out to all the children’s charities and programs in Orange County.”

Organizations that benefit from the profits of Hog Day include the Ronald McDonald House of Chapel Hill, Efland Ruritan Club and the Hillsborough Exchange Club.

“This first two years, we kind of incubated it to get it kind of up and running,” Lloyd said regarding the festivals theme, “Bringing Home the Bacon.” “We moved it over to Efland for a couple of years, and then we felt confident to take the leap of faith to bring home the bacon and bring it back to Hillsborough.”

Tony Gooch, the first-place winner in the Hog Day barbecue cook-off, is glad Hog Day has returned to Hillsborough.

“Now it’s back in Hillsborough, and we like this area,” Gooch said. “It’s nicer, it’s downtown — you get this homey feel and stuff like that.”

Gooch’s uncle competed in the cook-off for 20 years and won it twice, and Gooch has kept the tradition alive for the past three years, specializing in Eastern-style barbecue with vinegar sauce.

“You got a bunch of camaraderie with the other guys around here,” Gooch said. “I mean we’re competing, but we’re just a bunch of guys having a good time. Everyone thinks (their barbecue) is the best, but that’s really why we do it.”

Jenny Gephart and Kate Carroll, members of Kamado Girls, an all-girls barbecue team, said they keep coming back for the all-day, all-night, family environment.

“We gather, we eat, we grill, we cook,” Gephart said.

Hog Day is about keeping a community tradition alive while also finding a way to benefit Orange County.

“One of the things I think people really like is (that) we’ve kept it traditionally like it was years and years ago,” said Lloyd. “From the vendors to all the different types of music, we try to keep it as homey as we can.”

Gooch and Gephart are passing on the tradition to their children. Gooch’s 6-year-old son has already won first place in his own barbecue competition over the summer.

“The favorite part of it is really just seeing people I haven’t seen for years and years,” Lloyd said. “We call tonight kind of like the homecoming, because it’s really like a homecoming. I’ve seen people I haven’t seen in 10, 15, 20 years. That’s what makes me want to do it every year.”

A minor animal rights protest occurred at the festival around 9 p.m. Friday. About four protesters made their way from the grillers and exited through the bouncy castles.

“Some people voiced their opinion, and then they left,” said Troy Williams, deputy sheriff of Orange County.

city@dailytarheel.com