On Saturday, Sept. 9, Athens-Limestone County Tourism Association will host Superhero Day for the first time since Eli’s Block Party’s Kristie Williams “passed the red phone” earlier this year.

Eli’s Block Party is a nonprofit, all-volunteer, 501c3 that raises money year-round to donate at the end of year to that year’s beneficiary. After they pay their business expenses for the year and save $1,000 for a cancer family, they donate the rest to someone doing innovative childhood cancer research.

There are two main annual events for the nonprofit, the first being the car show held in April and the second being Saturday’s Superhero Day.

Williams founded Eli’s Block Party in 2015 when her son, Eli, was undergoing treatment for medulloblastoma.

Eli passed away at 12 years old on Aug. 5, 2017, after fighting medulloblastoma, including three relapses, for almost six years, starting when he turned 7 years old in 2011.

“We were doing some charitable things before that and then just sort of decided, you know, we could do bigger and more things if we were, you know, official with the paperwork,” Williams said. “We decided after we had done several things that we would organize as an official 501c3.”

“I got my sister and another couple of friends that had been pretty active with me. We officially formed the board in 2015,” she said.

The primary purpose of Eli’s Block Party is to fund innovative childhood cancer research. One way the organization accomplishes this is with an annual car show.

“My son was a real big car guy. So car shows are our main event we had. We’ve had a couple, but we do one main one now,” she said.

This April’s event was the 10th annual car show.

“We actually started with the car show before we were officially a 501c3, which is what kind of kicked us off,” Williams said. “It was so good and everybody was so generous and we thought ‘you know what? We just need to do this every year,’ and so we just continued with it each year.”

The annual car show is a fun day with music, vendors, and a Top 40 competition.

“Our biggest award is the headlight Hero Award and that’s where we have a cancer kid come pick his or her favorite vehicle and that’s our that’s our biggest trophy,” Williams said. “If you want to see a big old grown man cry, you just watch him get the headlight Hero Award because they love it.”

“You never know who’s going to get it, the kids they they base their favorite on whatever they want to is that not always the cleanest or the fanciest you just never know what they’re gonna pick as their favorite,” Williams said. “That’s what brings all the car guys and girls out because, you know, you never know what a kid’s gonna like.”

The event features a cancer family for the day.

“We bring them out and you know, set them up with some kind of shade and give them lunch and then you know, the cancer kid can pick their favorite vehicle and that’s who gets the biggest trophy,” she said. “It’s a lot of fun.”

“Our trophies have a cancer ribbon you know as the it’s a little trophy topper so it’s a little different from other car show trophies,” she said.

Because Eli was a car guy, they have a car they show in his memory.

“He’s big Mustang guy that was his, that was his favorite car,” Williams said. “We are not Mustang people. If anything, we are Chevy people, but for some reason he was a Ford guy.”

In honor of Eli, they are a member of the local Mustang club.

“We go to other car shows to take his car. We try to make sure we go to charity car shows mostly to show his car off, so it’s been fun and the community has been so incredibly supportive,” Williams said.

Superhero Day takes place at Big Spring Memorial Park and features a parade of superheroes at 10 a.m., followed by fun games, activities and rides for kids until 2 p.m. The suggested admission price is a penny per age of each attendee, and all funds will go to Eli’s Block Party, despite tourism’s organization of the event this year.

While most of the money from fundraising throughout the year goes toward childhood cancer research, a portion goes to families impacted by childhood cancer.

“We do have a savings account that we keep in case. We have children that pass away to childhood cancer in our community, and we have had to empty that a couple of times over the years,” Williams said. “Then we also take some of the money and if we hear that kids are in treatment will pay their utility bill a few times, and so we use our money locally.”

Williams is thankful for the support of the Athens-Limestone community.

“We’re always so grateful for the community and the city and the county,” she said. “The mayor has always been a big supporter of ours and the city’s always been really good to support our events and help us get the things we need to pull them off.”

“We always appreciate Lindsay Lane, working with us [to provide a parking lot for the car show]. All of our people are volunteers and we’ve never had a hard time finding volunteers or help, and so we just love the community so much and appreciate them supporting us,” she said.

Eli’s Block Party has made the following contributions to childhood cancer research:

• 2015 — $15,000 to St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital
• 2016 — $12,500 to Children’s Oncology Group
• 2017 — $20,000 to Dr. Ted Johnson at Children’s of Georgia
• 2018 — $25,000 to Dr. Ted Johnson at Children’s of Georgia
• 2019 — $20,000 to Dr. Greg Friedman at Children’s of Alabama
• 2020 — $18,500 to Dr. Greg Friedman at Children’s of Alabama
• 2021 — $28,000 to Dr. Greg Friedman at Children’s of Alabama
• 2022 — $20,000 to Dr. Greg Friedman at Children’s of Alabama