Big Hat Days

Before the festival opens at nine on an April Saturday, volunteers are out on Pollasky Avenue chalking the street. By midmorning the pavement of Old Town Clovis is under a crowd in hats: cowboy hats, sports caps, mushroom hats, and the oversized headwear the Fresno State Collegian said the event is known for, “where bigger is better.” Big Hat Days runs two days, Saturday until six and Sunday until five, and admission is free. The Clovis Chamber of Commerce hosts it, and it opens the town’s Rodeo Month each April.

Fifteen blocks of Pollasky

The festival’s directions place it on Pollasky Avenue between Third and Ninth Streets, one block west of Clovis Avenue. The Chamber’s 2026 program described it as spanning 15 blocks of Old Town. Visit Fresno County, FOX26, and the Collegian all counted more than 400 vendors for 2026. The Collegian counted over 350 in 2025. The program listed handmade artisan goods, fine photography, home décor, clothing, children’s toys, and specialty items. The Collegian added hats, jewelry, and trinkets. One 2025 vendor, Gary Christopher, was selling coolers, back at Big Hat Days for the first time in years. “I’ve had some returning customers that have come back and appreciated being here,” he told the paper. “The customers have just been stellar, really.”

Aleksey Vasilenko, who has attended for years, said the same paper’s reporters found him for the homemade goods. “It gets better and better every year,” he said. “My favorite part [is] the homemade trinkets people bring out.” The Chamber keeps its own booth on Pollasky between Third and Fourth Streets. In 2026 it sold official hats and T-shirts commemorating 250 years of America, the theme of that year’s festival.

The 2026 food list ran to kettle corn, cinnamon rolls, shaved ice, corn dogs, gourmet tacos, barbecue, crispy chicken, rice bowls, and wonton tacos. Chamber posts added funnel cakes and a flauta stand new that year. Boy Scouts from Sequoia Council troops walk the grounds selling Pepsi. “There’s tasty foods and fun little places that you wouldn’t normally see otherwise,” said Josiah Carlo, a festivalgoer, in 2025.

The beer garden at Bullard and Woodworth

At the corner of Bullard and Woodworth, next to the Clovis Elks Lodge, the Coors Banquet Beer Garden admits those 21 and over. Volunteers pour the beer, and local bands play from morning to close while people dance. The Chamber billed the music as country. The Collegian described country and rock.

The 2026 bill ran in two-hour sets. On Saturday, Scott Patrick opened at ten and John Pemberton followed at noon. South 65 played at two, and In Kahootz, in its second year, played from four to six. On Sunday, Houston Ave played its first Big Hat Days at eleven. John Pemberton and the Shotgun Riders, back after their debut the year before, took the one o’clock set. Chris Elkins’s Big Elk Band closed the festival from three to five.

Teacups on Fourth Street

The carnival sits on Fourth Street between Clovis Avenue and Woodworth and on Pollasky between Eighth and Ninth Streets. The 2026 rides were Mini Teacups, a Swing Carousel, Racing Horses, Dune Buggies, a Ferris Wheel, a Bounce House Playland, and a Star Wars Millennium Falcon inflatable. In 2025 the Collegian called the rides ones “some would say” were frightening. The Kids Zone has bounce houses, games, face painting, a petting zoo, and pony rides. Pets of any kind are barred from Old Town events, including pets carried in arms or pushed in carts.

The largest free parking lot is at the Clovis Rodeo Grounds, on the east side of Clovis Avenue between Bullard and Fifth Streets. The Clovis Rodeo Association provides it. Cadets of the Fresno County Sheriff’s Office Explorer Post 459 walk visitors across Clovis Avenue to the festival.

Sun hats, 1938

Big Hat Days began in 1938. The sources differ on whom it was meant to honor. The Collegian’s 2025 report says Clovis’s farmers and cowboys. The paper’s 2026 preview names farmers, cowboys, and loggers. The Chamber’s 2026 program says the farmers and ranchers who helped shape Clovis. All agree on the name: it came from the broad hats those workers wore against the valley sun.

According to FOX26, the festival normally falls on the first weekend of April. The 82nd edition was set for April 4 and 5, 2020. The coronavirus pandemic pushed it to June 20 and 21, and on May 20 the Chamber called it off: “While we were hopeful that we would be able to move forward with the 82nd annual BIG Hat Days street festival, based on the directives from Governor Newsome’s office, the Clovis Chamber of Commerce has made the decision to cancel BIG Hat Days 2020.” The 83rd returned to Old Town on June 12 and 13, 2021. FOX26 reported that up to 140,000 visitors would come.

The 87th, April 5 and 6, 2025, had blue skies and warm weather. The Collegian put yearly attendance at over 100,000. “I think it has a lot of cool vibes, the country and the city combined together,” said Fatima Miranda, who came with Vasilenko. The 88th, April 11 and 12, 2026, was worked by nearly 100 volunteers and went on “rain or shine,” as the Chamber had promised. Rain came at the close. The Chamber has set the next festival for April 3 and 4, 2027.