Thousands of people will be eating sweetcorn today in Adel during the 25th annual Sweet Corn Festival. Christee Lesch is a Sweet Corn Festival committee member who says the best part is — it’s free. She says it began with businesses thanking the community, but it’s grown to bring about ten-thousand people who come in from communities all over central Iowa. Lesch says the community gathered last night to shuck all the ears — seven TONS of corn, stored in a cooler overnight. A local businessman built a “giant sweetcorn cooker” and they started cooking this morning and will serve the corn as soon as the parade is over. Lesch says after the Sweet Corn Festival wraps up, organizers will go right back to work. She says “hundreds and hundreds” of volunteer hours go into the festival, and planning for next year’s will start in about two weeks. Sweet Corn Festival activities run from 9 AM to 11 PM today.