Pumpkins - History and Lore

In this season of Halloween, Thanksgiving and Fall harvests the pumpkin plays a major role, both as a decoration, Jack-O-Lanterns and center pieces, as well as food with pumpkin pie being the most famous.

The name pumpkin is descended from the centuries old Greek word pepon which meant "large melon" and obviously did not refer to the pumpkin that we now know.

The French then changed the pronunciation to pompon, but again the reference was to a melon or other gourd as the pumpkins that we know are native to the New World.

As with many French words, pompon crossed the English Channel and became pumpion, again still referring to another pumpkin like vegetable. When the English came to the New World they were introduced to what we know as pumpkins by the Indians.

Upon being introduced to the pumpkin these early English settlers modified the pronunciation, for a third time since its Greek origin, to the present pumpkin.

The pumpkin is native to the New World and was one of the foods grown by the Indians. Among the Iroquois of the northeastern U.S., the pumpkin was one of the group of crops known as the "three sisters" and was grown together with corn and beans. According to legend, a pregnant woman living in the sky world above the present world craved the bark of the root of the great tree that grew in the middle of the Sky World. Her husband, like all good husbands,acceded to her wish and scraped the dirt away from the base of the tree to expose the roots and creating a hole. After her husband had obtained the bark she desired, the woman leaned over and peered into the hole. However, she lost her balance and fell into and through the hole to the earth below, becoming the first human on earth. She eventually gave birth to a daughter who grew up and and became pregnant with twins by the West Wind. Just before the time came for their birth, the twins got into a fight about how they were to emerge from the womb. The left handed twin did not want to emerge in the usual way and, instead, forced himself out through his mother's left armpit, killing her in the process. The twins then buried their mother and from the spot where she was buried, there sprouted the corn, beans and pumpkins which became the main food staples of the Iroquois.

While the Iroquois men hunted, the women tended to the crops. Each spring the ground was prepared and the women carefully dug holes for the planting. Into each hole they placed a fish along with a corn, bean and pumpkin seed before covering the hole. The dead fish fertilized the ground for the seed, the corn stalk provided support for the bean plant to climb on, the pumpkin provided ground cover to keep the weeds out and the roots of the bean added nutrients to the soil. As spring moved into summer and summer to autumn, whole fields were filled with corn, beans and pumpkins growing together like the three sisters of legend to provide sustenance for the humanfamilies of the tribe.

When the first colonists arrived from England, they survived by trading with the Indians for food thereby becoming acquainted with the foods native to this country. But, they made their own contributions as well. In the case of the pumpkin they not only gave it the name we knew but, instead of cutting them into strips and baking them, the colonists cut off the top, scooped out the seeds, and then filled the hollow pumpkin with milk, honey and spices. Once filled, they replaced the top and baked the pumpkin in the hot coals of a fire thereby inventing pumpkin pie - in time they scooped out the meat from inside the pumpkin, mixed it with the milk, honey and spices and then baked the concoction in a crust to give us the version of the pie that we serve every Thanksgiving. The most recent contribution of Europeans to pumpkin lore was the arrival of the Irish in the mid-19th century. Upon their arrival they quickly saw that the pumpkin, being larger and already mostly hollow, was a superior substitute for the turnip in making Jack-O-Lanterns for Halloween.

Last week's article on the history of pumpkins drew a comment asking for more information about giant pumpkins and where most pumpkins are grown commercially today. I did some quick checking on the web for both. As to where the majority of pumpkins are grown commercially, the top ten states in the U.S. for pumpkin production are: Illinois, New York, Pennsylvania, California, Michigan, Ohio, New Jersey, Texas, New Mexico and Wisconsin. Pumpkins areversatile and can be grown in a wide range of soils and climates, but they are also bulky to ship. Given this, I suspect that the fact that these ten states are leaders inacreage devoted to pumpkin growing has more to do with their location near large population centers than with soil or climate. Being bulky and expensive to ship, shipping costs are probably the major factor in determining where the pumpkins are produced.

I also did some did some research on giant pumpkins and discovered that these are the result of a combination of heredity and environment with human ingenuity playing a major role in influencing both of these factors. Nova Scotia farmer Howard Dill, through selective breeding, has developed a strain of pumpkin plants that produce large pumpkins. He has named this strain of pumpkin plant "Atlantic Giant" and has obtained a patent on this breed of plant. Every site I visited on the web dealing with giant pumpkins recommended that growers, who wish to produce giant pumpkins, start with "Atlantic Giant" seeds.

The second part of the process is the environment. Growers of giant pumpkins who share their advice on the web are a combination of farmers and backyard gardeners. As I said above, all agree that the "Atlantic Giant" seed is the best. While all seem to agree on the heredity part, each one seems to have their own ideas about environment. Most growers advise starting the seeds indoors weeks before the end of frosts and the start of the normal planting season. This gives the plants a head start on growth. The next step is to have the proper soil, and here they all agree that soil is important. However, the advice varies somewhat among the growers. This is reasonable as the growers sharing their growing techniques on the web are scattered, geographically, from northern Canada to southwestern United States to Australia. This covers a lot of different soil types, each presenting its own somewhat unique requirements. The wide geographic area covering different climate zones also speaks to the versatility of the pumpkin which seems capable of producing record size pumpkins almost anywhere. As to soil, a number of growers recommend keeping the soil pH (pH is a measure of the acidity level of a substance) within a certain range by adding lime to raise the level and sulfur to lower it. Fertilizer is also important and most emphasize the need to have sufficient organic matter in the soil. Again, each has their own list of does and don'ts, not all of which agree so you will have to experiment to see what works best for you.

Once transplanted into the garden, the pumpkin seedlings have to be cared for by fertilizing and watering regularly. Starting the plants early and then transplanting the seedlings gives the plant a longer growing season which is critical because, in its later stages of growth a giant pumpkin can increase by as much as 10 - 20 pounds or more per day, so the more days it has to grow the bigger it will get.

Like all plants, pumpkins start with a flower and the transfer of pollen from a male to a female flower is what produces the pumpkin. This will occur naturally however, time being of the essence, growers can give their pumpkins a few extra days head start by transferring pollen from male to female flower themselves rather than waiting for the bees to perform this task.

There are two other things that most recommend and that is repositioning of the stem between the vine and pumpkin and pruning the vine. All seem to recommend that, once pumpkins start growing on a plant, the grower should slowly begin to reposition the stem between the vine and the pumpkin so that it grows perpendicular to the vine and not at an angle to the vine. Second, since the object is to produce a giant pumpkin, the grower wants to focus the plant's energy on the pumpkin and not other parts of the plant. Therefore, growers recommend regular pruning of the vine to remove excess stems and leaves. Also, a pumpkin vine is capable of producing more than one pumpkin, but, here again, you want to concentrate the vine's energy on producing a giant pumpkin and not divide the plant's growing capabilities among a number of smaller pumpkins. Therefore, once the pumpkins have had time to begin growing, you should select the biggest and healthiest one to keep and cut the others off, gambling that this one will survive and grow to record size. If you have sufficient room in your garden you can hedge your bets by planting more than one pumpkin vine.

This is just a quick summary about how an individual can assist Mother Nature to produce a record size pumpkin. If you would like to learn more here are links to a couple of good sites. Champion pumpkin grower and creater of the "Atlantic Giant" seed, Howard Dill shares his advice and sells his seeds at http://www.howarddill.com/. Another excellent site, both for its content and excellent links is http://www.backyardgardener.com/pumplink.html