The Southeast Alabama Highland games has been a part of the wiregrass event landscape for over Ten years now, having held its first event in Dothan Alabama in 2016. Over the last ten years, there have been eight events and our ninth being planned for October 24, 2026! But the true history of our games does not start in 2016, but instead in winter of 2012.

Chris Wren and Chris Bailey had been friends for years and had a love of Scottish heritage and a growing movement of kilt wearing in the United States that started with the creation of the Utility Kilt in Seatle, Washington. The two Chris’ would occasionally get together for dinner with their significant others and proudly wear their kilts to dinner around Dothan, AL. Despite the movement on the West Coast, Southeast Alabama had not experienced many men wearing kilts casually, but the reaction was fairly positive. After getting together a few times, the two began discussing their friend Ed Coleman that they had seen wearing his kilt to events in Atlanta, and invited him to join them at dinner. At the time, Ed did not feel comfortable wearing his kilt out in Dothan, and the Chris’ decided to try and do something to encourage him to feel more comfortable doing so. And this was created the facebook group called the Twisted Kilts.

While this group had been created with the intent of organizing get togethers for a single friend, it quickly began growing in numbers with others in the Wiregrass area. The number of people with Scottish Heritage and those that shared a love of wearing kilts was surprising at first and suddenly the small group of friends found themselves making new acquaintances on the social media group! As the numbers grew, get togethers began happening and one of the first of these happened at a small pub called McLeods. It was at this event that the small group met the guitarist and drummer of the Throwing Stones.

Scotty Johnson and Dewain Leitzen had been friends for many years and the name of their band was a head nod to their history of competing in the heavy athletics events of many Highland Games not only across the US, but in the UK as well. The two joined the facebook group, and not long after this Scotty reached out to the group with an idea. For many years he had traveled out of the Dothan area to compete, and thought that there should be one in Dothan! It was from this idea that a handful of people met together at the home of Mike Morrison and discussed the creation of the Southeast Alabama Highland Games in 2014!

It took about a year and a half to get the Southeast Alabama Highland Games off the ground. A nonprofit was formed, and the group began looking for financial support to produce their first event. This first event was a surprising success to the group! They found support and encouragement from the community and for the first time Dothan Alabama had a cultural event to celebrate St Patrick’s day!

The event was held at the Farm center for three years, and then the Peanut Festival grounds for one and began developing relationships among the Athletes, the Scottish Clan conveiners, and the Vendors that put this event on their calendars to attend year after year. Things were going well for the event, and people would attend the festivities growing the community of people that enjoyed the games and heritage. Just as things were ramping up for their fifth event, to be held on St Patricks Day in 2020, all things came to a grinding halt with the arrival of the Covid pandemic, and the event was canceled just two weeks out.

A year later, things were still not quite open from the pandemic, and the group could not in good faith hold their event on their usual weekend in March, so they committed themselves to try pushing it back another six months to see what things were like at that time. It was during this time that the members of the board were introduced to the Mayor of Daleville, Jaime Staton. It was from this new relationship that the next games were formed and the city of Daleville AL rolled out the red carpet welcoming the event, and helping them recover from the financial loss of going over a year without producing their event.

The 2021 games were held in September and for the next three years until the absolute hottest event that the group had ever produced. In September of 2024, the weather was sweltering, the athletes competed, the pipers piped, the Irish dancers performed all through the tremendous heat throughout the day, but the public mostly stayed home to stay out of the sun.

In preparation of the 2025 games, and with funds low from the previous year, the board of directors began discussing a change to help bolster the event and bring a new level of involvement to the community that the Southeast Alabama Highland games had developed over the years. The desire was to create a new organization going back to its roots and encouraging community and engagement of those that love all things Celtic. And thus was born the Southeast Celtic Society! With this new Heritage organization, the Southeast Alabama Highland games looks forward to being the premier event among other quarterly gatherings taking place throughout the year.

We thank those who have supported us over the last decade, and are excited what the future holds for this new era for the Southeast Alabama Highland Games and the Southeast Celtic Society!

Sláinte!!