The tomatoes are gone by nine.

Saturday morning, go to the Beaumont Farmers Market on College Street. Eight to eleven, and eight is when the good stuff is still there. Homegrown tomatoes, yard eggs, local honey, fresh baked goods, and something cool to drink while you walk around. It's all under a pavilion, so the heat and a little rain won't run you off.

After that, the weekend fills in on its own. Two movie nights Friday, one downtown and one up in Vidor. Kids' clothes and a fifteen-foot coloring wall Sunday afternoon. The Black Crowes at Ford Park Sunday night.

School starts back soon. This is one of the last wide open weekends before the mornings get busy, so take it.

A Nederland Grad Is Playing for Team USA

Rylee Bolser graduated from Webber International University in May, where she played flag football through her college career. She is now one of only four collegiate athletes in the country selected to represent the United States at the World Flag Series in Tampa. Thirty athletes, ten countries, three teams, and one of them came up right here in the Golden Triangle.

Flag football has grown fast enough to have a world stage. Southeast Texas has somebody standing on it.

A Night for the People Who Show Up

The Southeast Texas Visionary Awards are August 8 at five o'clock, right here in Beaumont. One night for the people quietly holding this region together. Nonprofits, educators, entrepreneurs, artists, and the folks doing community service without anyone asking them to.

Solomon and Tierrene' Ajao started it, and they put it plainly. "This isn't just a show. It's a seed."

Nominations and tickets are both open at setvawards.com. If a name came to mind while you were reading this, go put it in.

Here's what's worth getting out for this week, Beaumont.

👨‍👩‍👧 Family Fun

🎬 The Sandlot · Friday, July 31, 7 PM · Jefferson Theatre, 345 Fannin St

🌿Beaumont Farmers Market · Saturday, August 1, 8 to 11 AM · 6525 College St · Free to browse

👨‍👩‍👧 The Closet Social: Tiny Trendsetters · Sunday, August 2, 2 to 6 PM · Beaumont Civic Center, 701 Main St · ticketed

🥂 Out on the Town

🎶 The Australian Bee Gees: Feel the Fever Again · Saturday, August 1, doors 7 PM, show 8 PM · Jefferson Theatre · $57 and $47 through Ticketmaster

Stayin' Alive, Night Fever, Jive Talkin', all of it, in a room built for exactly this. Book early in the week. A tribute show in a theatre that old sells better than people expect.

🎶 The Black Crowes and Whiskey Myers, with Southall · Sunday, August 2 · Ford Park Amphitheatre

🤝 BBB Lunch and Learn: Rivals to Revenue · Thursday, July 30, 11 AM to 1 PM · Connie and Paul Szuch Multipurpose Center at LIT · $30, lunch included · full details in Beaumont Builds below

🎈 Hot Air Balloon Glo Festival · Saturday, August 8, 4 PM · Bridge City Elementary School

Nine hot air balloons lighting up at dusk, tethered rides, local bands, food trucks, craft vendors, inflatables, and a petting zoo. Worth the drive, and worth staying until dark.

🎬 Classic Movie in the Park: E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial · Friday, July 31, 8 PM · Conn Park, Vidor · Free

Lawn chairs, blankets, concessions, and a movie that still gets people. Twenty minutes up the road, and it costs you nothing.

Good people doing good work right here.

Tom Neal and the Legacy Exhibit

There is a museum forty minutes down the road that has spent years tracking down the people this coast produced. This month four more names went up on its wall.

Dickie Richards, a bareback and bull rider.

The Chelette sisters, who sang on Ted Mack's Amateur Hour and shared stages with Elvis on the Louisiana Hayride. They started on local radio at ages two, five, and eight, and the two-year-old sang bass.

Charles Stutzenbaker, a Texas Parks and Wildlife biologist whose research got lead shot banned in duck hunting nationwide. He also went toe-to-toe with the Army Corps of Engineers over cutting canals through the wetlands.

Jim "Cowboy" Fernandez, world champion duck caller and inventor of the Sure Shot call. When the Duck Dynasty crew came asking, he told them he would not build theirs, but he would show them where he got his materials so they could build their own.

Tom Neal directs the Museum of the Gulf Coast in Port Arthur and talks about these people like family. There are more than 260 of them on that wall now, with another fifteen or so coming this year. He is clear about why it matters. "Every kid thinks they live in a dead-end street," he says. The wall is the argument against that.

Go on a Saturday. Take a kid who needs to see it.

New doors, big milestones, and the leaders growing our city.

A Familiar Name Comes Back to City Hall

Laura Clark is Beaumont's new Deputy City Manager, and she is not new here at all. She was the city's Chief Financial Officer from 2007 to 2016, running the budget along with municipal court, fleet, employee benefits, and water customer service. She spent the last decade at Olson Engineering as Vice President of Finance and Administration, and before any of that, ten years in public accounting right here at Edgar, Kiker and Cross.

She is a Lamar grad and a CPA. She serves as a trustee for Orangefield ISD. Her husband Trey directs track and field at Lamar. Deep roots is not a figure of speech in her case.

The BBB's Fall Harvest of Trust Series Kicks Off Thursday

The BBB Southeast Texas Foundation is launching its Fall Harvest of Trust Lunch and Learn series this week, and the first one lands Thursday.

It's called Rivals to Revenue: Turning Competition to Collaboration. Sherry Barrow of Global Edge Group gives the keynote, followed by a panel with Travis Woods of TL Solutions, Todd Boley of the Texas Manufacturing Assistance Center, Ty Coudrain of AFLAC, and David Kibodeaux of J&J Exterminating.

Thursday, July 30, 11 AM to 1 PM at the Connie and Paul Szuch Multipurpose Center at LIT.

$30 gets you in, with lunch included. A half table is $225, and a table sponsorship is $400 if you want to bring your team or a few clients.

Reserve your seat →

That's two days out, so register today if you're going. And if Thursday doesn't work, this is the first of the series, so there will be another one to catch.

Community Exposed. The good stuff nobody's talking about.

Twenty Six Kids Spent a Week Inside Their Own City

Mayor Roy West's LEAD43 Summer Leadership Academy put 26 middle and high school students through a week most of us who live here have never had.

They toured the Port of Beaumont and the ExxonMobil refinery. They went through Baptist Hospitals of Southeast Texas, learned CPR from ambulance crews, ran a fire truck ladder, and walked through the police department's real-time crime center. They met with city leaders, spent time inside city departments, and got out on the Neches aboard the Ivory Bill.

Got a middle or high schooler at home? Keep an eye on lead43.org. There were only 26 spots this year, and next summer will be here quicker than you think.

A look at what's on the market around Beaumont this week.

🔑 THE FIND

21 Sandelwood Trail · West End 2 beds · 2.5 baths · 2,024 sq ft

$279,900

A brick ranch with a covered front porch and a walkway winding up through the flower beds. Inside there's a fireplace framed by built-in bookshelves and a tray ceiling in the living room.

Click here to view

🏡 THE KEEPER

1540 Infinity Ln · West End 5 beds · 3.5 baths · 3,492 sq ft

$599,500

Board and batten over brick, a two-story great room, and a driveway that could hold every car your family owns.

Click here to view

✨THE STUNNER

5950 Keith Rd · Lumberton 5 beds · 4 baths · 6,600 sq ft · 5.97 acres · built 2005

$980,000

White columns at the end of a long private drive, sitting on almost six acres. Worth clicking through the photos even if you are not moving.

Click here to view

Things you didn't ask for, but now you’re a step ahead.

This week: take a picture of your fridge and pantry and let AI plan dinner

Groceries are expensive, and the five o'clock question is exhausting. Here's a small fix that costs nothing and takes about a minute.

Open your fridge and take a picture. Open your pantry and take one of that too. Then open ChatGPT or Claude on your phone, attach both photos, and paste this in:

That's it. No typing out a list, no inventory. It reads the shelves and works with what it sees.

You'll get a week of meals and a short grocery list instead of a full one. Try it once this week and hit reply to tell me what it came up with. I want to know if it holds up in a real Beaumont kitchen.

Tuesday: 94° / 77° · ☀️ · Hot and mostly clear.

Wednesday: 94° / 77° · ⛅ · About a 35 percent chance of rain. Take an umbrella.

Thursday: 96° / 78° · ☀️ · The hottest stretch starts here.

Friday: 96° / 79° · ☀️ · Dry and clear, which is good news if you are headed to Conn Park for the movie.

Saturday: 95° / 78° · ⛅ · Back up to about 35 percent. The market is under a pavilion, so go anyway.

Sunday: 95° / 78° · ⛅ · Another 35 percent. If you have Ford Park tickets, check the radar that afternoon and pack a poncho.

Drink water. Park in the shade if you can find any.

A market on Saturday morning, two movie nights, a disco tribute, and a rock show. Not bad for the last week of July. Pick one. Go.

See you next Tuesday.

Jenny Lee · Locally written. Community trusted.