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NEWS BRIEFS
Pumpkin Festival draws to a close
Mark Winnell (Cherokee name Wo-di-ge-A-s-go-li) looks on as his 3-year-old grandson Hunter Winnell (Cherokee name Luga Vula) participates is some drumming as part of the Cherokee-Shawnee encampment at the West Virginia Pumpkin Festival Sunday.
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MILTON, W.Va. — Thousands of people walked out of the West Virginia Pumpkin Park in Milton with a pumpkin Sunday, but only a few walked out with a pumpkin that weighed hundreds of pounds.
Paul Farell of Huntington traded $975 for nearly 1,500 pounds of pumpkin. He placed the winning bids for the largest in-state and out-of-state pumpkin auctions.
The largest in-state pumpkin weighed 575 pounds and the largest out-of-state pumpkin weighed in at 770 pounds.
Farell told some of the audience members that he plans to put the pumpkin out in his yard, and he might event attempt to carve it into a jack-o-lantern.
An estimated 55,000 to 65,000 attendants shuffled through the grounds of the Pumpkin Park Sunday.
“My favorite part of the pumpkin festival is just seeing the smiles on people’s faces,” said Bill Kelley, president of the festival. “Everyone just works together to help make this a great event.”
The board of organizers of the festival is made up of 25 area volunteers. The proceeds from the sale of the giant pumpkins goes toward a scholarship fund.
“We award three scholarships each worth $2,000 every year,” Kelley said.
Kelley said the Pumpkin Festival also has one of the best juried arts and crafts shows in the state. Even the food vendors are carefully selected for quality.
“We have a little over 30 food vendors here,” Kelley said. “But we turned even more than that away. We select them very carefully to make sure we get the best.”
The festival was not all about pumpkins; an interesting set of machinery producing a sweet scent was set near the entrance of the festival.
The sweet smell was the hot sorghum molasses being freshly produced by the Lincoln County FFA students. Students raised the product from planting, cutting, stripping to cooking and sold the product at the festival.
Ryan Saxe, the group’s teacher, said the students made and sold between 150 to 250 gallons of sorghum syrup. The money is used to send the Lincoln County FFA Chapter to a national convention.
Saxe said most of the money for the trip would be covered by sales at the Pumpkin Festival.
“I have been out here every day this week,” said Ashley Neal, the Lincoln County FFA secretary. “A lot of kids were really dedicated to this fundraiser and they have been out here every day.”
Kelley said the overall attendance of the festival is up this year. He also said he has noticed a few things he seeks to improve for next year.
“We would like to improve the road and traffic at the festival,” Kelley said. “We need places for motorcycles and more handicapped spots. We also want to keep adding more businesses and more arts and crafts.”
The festival grounds and organization are funded by the proceeds from the previous years’ festivals.
“It’s become a full-tim job,” Kelley said of planning the festival. “But we are going to keep it going and make it better each year.”
