9 Things That Instantly Give Away Someone Who Grew Up in Alabama
If white barbecue sauce at a cookout doesn’t faze you, we’re willing to bet you’re from Alabama.
Here are the signs that instantly give away someone who grew up in the Yellowhammer state.
1. County Numbers on Plates
Alabama license plates carry a number that names their home county.
The code gives the first three numbers to Jefferson, Mobile and Montgomery counties, in that order.
Every other county follows alphabetically, from 4 up to 67.
Once you know that, you can place a car’s home county from the next lane over.
Many people who grew up with it read the number at a glance.
Try it tomorrow.
2. Mobile Bay Jubilees
A jubilee is the morning when fish, crab and shrimp pile up in the shallows of Mobile Bay.
You can walk the shoreline and scoop up flounder, shrimp and crabs.
Many jubilees happen along the upper Eastern Shore of the bay.
Oxygen-poor water from the bottom of the bay pushes the fish and crabs ashore.
Some people make friends with bayfront residents, hoping for a phone call, according to Gulf Coast Media.
You can’t schedule one.
What Sets Off a Jubilee in Alabama
The day before has to bring cloud cover, a light wind from the east and a calm bay.
The tide has to be rising.
Jubilees only come in summer, typically before sunrise.
3. White Barbecue Sauce
White barbecue sauce starts with mayonnaise, apple cider vinegar, lemon juice, black pepper and salt.
No, that isn’t a typo.
Bob Gibson created it at Big Bob Gibson’s Bar-B-Q in Decatur in 1925.
He first used it only on chicken.
If you grew up dunking smoked chicken in it, you’ve been eating a recipe more than a century old.
4. Iron Bowl Rivalry
The Iron Bowl began in 1893 at Lakeview Park in Birmingham.
Auburn won, 32-22.
The series stopped after 1907 when the schools couldn’t agree on contract details.
It resumed in 1948.
Auburn coach Shug Jordan named it in the early 1950s.
Many kids pick a side long before they understand the game.
If you wear the wrong color in the wrong town, you’ll hear about it.
5. Rolling Toomer’s Corner
Toomer’s Corner is the spot where Auburn fans throw toilet paper into the oaks after a win.
Sheldon Toomer finished pharmacy school at Auburn in 1896, then bought the drugstore from his stepfather.
Fans first ripped ticker tape off the store windows and threw it into the oaks.
If you grew up near Auburn, you probably aimed a roll at those branches.
Then came 2010.
A caller admitted poisoning the oaks with herbicide that year.
The university removed the trees in 2013 and planted a third generation in 2017.
In 2022, the university officially announced that fans could roll the new oaks after home football wins.
6. Space Camp in Huntsville
Space Camp runs out of the U.S. Space & Rocket Center in Huntsville, which opened in 1970 as a public-relations extension of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s Marshall Spaceflight Center.
Von Braun envisioned it.
The center also displays one of the three remaining Saturn V rockets from that era.
The camp itself began in 1982 as a way to get kids interested in math, science and technology careers.
Campers learned what it would be like to be an astronaut.
Space Camp programs operate or are being built abroad too, in countries including Canada, Belgium and Japan.
Many people who grew up near Huntsville have a Space Camp story, and if you went as a kid, you’ve probably told yours a few times.
7. Conecuh Sausage
Conecuh sausage has been smoked over hickory in Evergreen since 1947, according to the company.
Hickory does the work.
Evergreen even holds an annual festival in honor of the local sausage.
Conecuh County takes its name from a Creek term, koha anaka, that means near canebrakes.
The Alabama Territorial Legislature created the county in 1818.
If you grew up on it, you’ve probably fried it for breakfast and grilled it for supper.
8. Mardi Gras in Mobile
Mobile’s Mardi Gras floats are piled high with toys, candy and MoonPies.
The Encyclopedia of Alabama calls the MoonPie the city’s signature treat.
If you grew up near Mobile, you may have caught one with both hands.
On New Year’s Eve in 1831, cotton broker Michael Krafft and friends held a parade downtown with rakes, cowbells and farm tools.
They called themselves the Cowbellion de Rakin Society.
Cowbells came first.
Psst! How Alabama was your childhood? Run through this checklist and see where you stand.
9. National Peanut Festival
The National Peanut Festival runs November 6-15, 2026, at the fairgrounds in Dothan.
Alabama’s tourism site calls it the nation’s largest peanut festival.
George Washington Carver was the keynote speaker at the first one.
That was in 1938.
If you go on Saturday, November 14, you can catch the parade at 9:30 a.m. downtown.
Gates open at 10 a.m., with rides running until midnight.
Many people who grew up near Dothan have a festival memory.
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Her daughter bites her tongue until the car leaves the driveway.
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