This year American Village celebrates its 25th anniversary. See the full story here. Share your American Village story with us. Did you visit as a student? What do you remember most? Do you have a funny story about your visit? Did your visit here impact your choice of education or career? Submit your story here. Listen to teacher Tom McCall’s American Village story here.

The 9th Annual Festival of Tulips will open Saturday, February 22nd! This is not peak bloom, but there will be a good variety of tulips to photograph and pick. Peak bloom usually occurs a week to 10 days after opening. New tulip varieties planted this year: Watch the video!

The National Day of Prayer is Thursday, May 1. At the American Village, we will have a Prayer Breakfast, beginning at 8:00 a.m. This year’s speaker is Edie Hand. Edie Hand is the founder and international author of Women of True Grit, a sisterhood and community stemmed from The Edie Hand Foundation that takes stories and turns them into empowerment for women to succeed in business and in life. The Edie Hand Foundation started over fifteen years ago in honor of her three young Blackburn brothers she lost too soon. Having gone through irritations such as loss, grief, illness, and set-backs Edie exemplifies “True Grit” and has built a movement transforming challenges into Pearls of Hope. GRIT stands for “Great Resilience Is Transformative” and Edie is passionate and devoted to supporting women and providing them the tools to do hard things and turn them into beautiful situations. The message she shares is not heart warming, its heart moving and aims to build strength in whichever audience is listening and encourage them to know they are not alone in facing their hardships with “Pearls On, Swords Up!” Edie also comes from a wonderful family heritage of songwriting, acting, and music from the Hood-Hacker-Presley family. Her legendary cousin was Elvis Presley. Introducing Edie and saying a few words at the Prayer Breakfast will be former Alabama First Lady Patsy Riley, one of the Women of True Grit featured in Edie’s book.     Providing music for the event will be devoted woman of faith and prophetic worship leader, Ashley Gronholm. Ashley will perform her recent single “Miracle in Me.” Listen to it here.   Tickets are $30 per person. Copies of Edie’s book Women of True Grit are $20. She will sign them at the Prayer Breakfast. $5 from the sale of each book will be donated to the American Village. Pre-reservations are required. To make a reservation, please buy your tickets below or call (205) 665-3535 x 1031.

Take a look at our recently added Virtual Tours pages. Share the American Village with friends and family who may not have had the opportunity to visit in person.

American Village to host Medal of Honor Secondary Educator Training Register today at www.cmohs.org/training. Download and share the PDF.