Center Street Giant Pumpkin Festival returns to Logan

Community members, pumpkin growers and Utah State University students gathered at the fourth annual Center Street Giant Pumpkin Festival, which offered a first-place prize of more than double the prize money of last year. This year, however, the winning pumpkin was disqualified.  

 A pumpkin weighing in at 2,258 pounds was transported from Rexburg, Idaho to Logan for the competition, but was disqualified by judges because of a new rule that was put in place this year by an international organization called the Great Pumpkin Commonwealth, said Ed Dennis, one of the five judges at the weigh-off. The pumpkin had multiple large soft spots on the underside, indicating the pumpkin was rotting.  

 According to this year’s rulebook, entries with more than two soft spots and soft spots greater than three inches in any direction disqualifies a pumpkin.   

“The hard part was that it was over an $11,000 prize he would have won,” Dennis said. “It was a very difficult decision, so we felt really bad about it. It kind of put a sour note on the whole day.”  

 This disqualification made Mohamed Sadiq, a neurologist who works in Layton, Utah, the winner, with a pumpkin weighing 2,144 pounds.  

 The payout for the winner was $5 per pound of pumpkin, giving Sadiq a prize of $10,720 — more than double last year’s $5,000 first-place payout.  

 Dennis said this year there were considerably fewer pumpkins than usual entered in the competition.  

 “It’s really dependent on the weather,” Dennis said. “With all the heat we had this year and the water shortage, many of the growers lost their pumpkins.”  

 In addition to the weigh-off, the festival featured vendor booths, food trucks and free activities such as a pumpkin pie-eating competition and a movie at the Utah Theatre.  

 “I went last year, and this year it seemed like there were more booths to look at and more activities for kids to do,” said Utah State student Charlotte Clark. “There were also a lot of food options, which was nice.”  

 According to Clint Nash, the president of the Utah Giant Pumpkin Growers, the logistics of the event are handled by Anderson’s Seed and Garden, a local business owned by Mark Anderson, Logan city’s mayor.  

 Anderson’s Seed and Garden estimated that about 20,000 people would attend the event.  

 “I would say there were almost too many people,” Clark said. “It was super packed and hard to move around a lot of the time,” 

 Clark said events like this can help students feel like part of the Logan community.  

 “It gives us a chance to connect with people outside of our age group and interact with people we normally wouldn’t,” Clark said. “It was fun to have a place to go outside of campus for an event and meet new people.”  

 Utah State student Ruth Rasmussen also attended the event and said she enjoyed eating pumpkin cheesecake crepes from The Crepery and walking through the booths.  

 “We just love fall, and so what better way to celebrate fall than with a pumpkin festival,” Rasmussen said.