Hamburg’s Hoop Hero
Hamburg native Scottie Pippen is lauded as “one of the most talented and successful athletes from the state of Arkansas” by the Encyclopedia of Arkansas.
The future star for basketball’s Chicago Bulls was born on Sept. 25, 1965, as the youngest of 12 children of Preston and Ethel Pippen. His father worked at a paper mill until a stroke forced him to retire when his athletic son was 14.
Pippen also played baseball and football at Hamburg High School but was determined to succeed in basketball. However, he was only 6’2” and weighed just 150 pounds as a Hamburg High School senior, so no college recruited him.
He eventually attended the University of Central Arkansas in Conway and helped its basketball team win two conference championships. He joined the Bulls as the fifth player chosen in the 1987 NBA draft. Like Michael Jordan, he played in both strings of Bulls’ NBA championships, from 1991-1993 and 1996-1998.
Now 59, he lives in the Los Angeles area.
City anticipates World Famous Armadillo Festival
An armadillo race can be an antic adventure, as throngs of visitors are likely to discover on May 3 at Hamburg’s World Famous Armadillo Festival.
Placed at the starting line by owners for last year’s big race, one of the half-dozen, nine-banded contestants stood motionless. Four others meandered sideways to the fence enclosing the short racecourse. Only one armadillo actually made it to the finish line, drawing cheers from the packed crowd.
Trying to race armadillos poses several problems: They are solitary and largely nocturnal. They nap in burrows, usually coming out to forage for insects only around dusk. Their normal gait is a slow shuffle. If frightened, they can jump 3 feet to 4 feet high. They also can kick with powerfully clawed feet, which is why participants picked them up by the tail.
It really didn’t matter that the armadillo event was more of a ramble than a full-fledged race. It was just one attraction during the busy final day of the four-day celebration centered on the square-block park in the headquarters city of Ashley-Chicot Electric Cooperative. This year’s festival takes place April 30-May 3.
Other fun includes a frog-jumping contest, a show of costumed dogs, a hamburger-eating contest, a car show, a magic show, live music and a 5K Dillo Dash (for humans, not the festival’s armor-plated headliners).
Entrants in last year’s frog-jumping contest seemed to have sharper competitive instincts. Dropped onto the starting line by their half-dozen young owners, nearly all the amphibians hopped their way to the finish line to shouts and applause from onlookers.
After watching eight fast-food enthusiasts gobble their way through a Hamburg hamburger-eating contest, many in the audience headed for
the midway food vendors. Others crossed the street to the popular Twisted Pelican Marketplace + Boujee Boards & More, 101 N. Main St. Boujee Boards are charcuterie plates of cold meats, cheeses, nuts and other goodies.
Last year’s festival attracted as many as 10,000 visitors, according to Caitlin Martin, board president of the Hamburg Area Chamber of Commerce. For the first time, it included a fireworks show, planned again for 2025.
“The World Famous Armadillo Festival has become a staple event not only in Hamburg and Ashley County, but across our region, including northern Louisiana and western Mississippi,” Martin says.
“Over the last five years, it has grown a lot, thanks to the
addition of more live music. This year, we are excited about our musical lineup with country’s Frank Foster as the Saturday headliner and the Trey Hawkins Band as his opener. All our concerts are free to the public.”
A special event took place during the last day of the 2024 festival. Ashley County Museum, decked with painted cutouts of armadillos on its lawn, dedicated an exhibit devoted to renowned Arkansas author Charles Portis. The museum will open during this year’s fest.
Portis, who wrote “True Grit,” along with other novels and short stories, attended Hamburg High School after moving here with three siblings in 1948, when his father became superintendent of the city’s schools.
The oldest section of the Hamburg Cemetery, established in 1859, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Other Hamburg properties on the National Register include: the Hamburg Commercial Historic District, the Ashley County Courthouse, the W.R. Bruckley House, the Watson House, the Watson-Sawyer House, Hamburg Presbyterian Church, First United Methodist Church, Crossroads Fire Tower and the Sumner-White Dipping Vat.