People setting up tents to watch Thunder on the Ohio, Thunder was an unlimited hydroplane race presented during the Freedom Festival. It has not been presented since 2009. The Evansville Freedom Festival was an annual festival in Evansville, Indiana that celebrates the Fourth of July. What began in 1970 with only a handful of events has grown to include unlimited boat racing, airshows, food booths, dances, and music culminating with a fireworks show over the Evansville riverfront. In recent years the Freedom Festival has been renamed, struggled financially, been sponsored by other organizations, and at times cancelled.