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If you’ve ever been involved in guessing the weight of the big pumpkin at the Pumpkin Festival, be sure to guess higher than in previous years, as this is the heaviest pumpkin in the festival’s history.
The Sister Cities partner with the City of Franklin and the Williamson County Heritage Foundation to bring pumpkins from one of the Franklin Sister Cities in Carlton, Ontario to the Pumpkin Festival each year. Sister Cities are offering festival goers a contest to guess the weight of the pumpkin, and the winner who guesses the closest weight will win a prize. There are two types, one for adults and one for children.
Sister Cities Board Chair Summer Sheldon said this year’s pumpkins are worth seeing.
“This is the heaviest pumpkin we’ve ever given us at a pumpkin festival in our history,” Sheldon said. Franklin and Carlton have been sister cities since 2006. Pumpkins are an expensive gift for sister cities, costing nearly $5,000 to produce and transport.
“You have to come and see this pumpkin and guess the weight this year,” Sheldon added.
While the sister cities deliver the pumpkin, the City of Franklin Public Works/Streets Department helps unload and store the pumpkin until it’s ready to be displayed at the festival.
“The Streets Department is very proud of pumpkins and we can’t thank them enough,” Shelton said. “Last year was the only year they couldn’t ship pumpkins because of the COVID-19 restrictions in Canada.”
Board member Jason Collins drove to Canada last year to pick up and bring pumpkins to Franklin. “My kids have grown up with giant pumpkins since we’ve been here,” he said. “It carries on the tradition that others in Franklin and Williamson County can continue to enjoy it.”
Shelton said the pumpkin growing process is very secretive, so it’s a bit of a mystery to know how farmers get the pumpkins to the size they make.
“We don’t know who grows it and how they grow it,” he said. “But what they’ve done this year has really worked.”
Sheldon also mentioned that the pumpkins are much prettier than last year’s. “This year’s squash is a light orange; last year’s squash wasn’t as appealing, it was a greenish-brown squash.”
The pumpkins had to be seeded as they crossed the Canadian border this year. Due to concerns about agriculture and the spread of the disease, the USDA requires pumpkins to be opened and all seeds removed before crossing the border. “The weight is based on the original weight of the pumpkins when they were harvested in Canada,” Shelton said.
access www.williamsonheritage.org or www.Sistiercities.org More about the festival and the Great Pumpkin.
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