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Bob the Bomb creates buzz for Battle of Byron

Ahead of the festival you can hunt down the character for a prize

BYRON, Ga. — For the first time since 2017, the Battle of Byron is back.

It's a festival with food, music and fun games like tug of war and mud pit volleyball.

Austin Simar made plans for a special guest Friday.

"When Bob gets here we're going to leave him outside," Simar said.

How rude, that is until you see who they're talking about.

Bob is a large cut out bomb with cartoon hands and a wick ready to blow.

The guest that will sit outside Brittany Rae's shop for the next week or so got an official police escort.

"It's pretty cool to have it back I'm not going to lie," Detective Will Patterson said.

Call Bob a blast from the past.

For over forty years he's served as an ambassador for the Battle of Byron.

But he hadn't seen the light of day since 2017.

Byron couldn't find anyone to chair the committees to get it off the ground in 2018, then came the pandemic.

"They had a storage unit where everything was stored and in the very back was the giant cut out of Bob and I was like 'ohh my goodness that is the coolest thing in the world'", Simar said.

Simar got some tools and beefed Bob up.

"I had to give him another coat of yellow he didn't have a wick so we had to reattach his wick,"  he said. 

Now Bob's trying to create some buzz for the battle.

If you spot him, bounce into the host shop, fill out a card and you could win a prize.

Nicole Groom took up the challenge.

"I saw it and I was like I'm going to come in here and I'm going to fill out the Bob card," she said. 

Bob will go to a new location every week or so.

The Battle of Byron is May 6. 

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