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The Pumpkin Man

It’s a Halloween Harvest at Elmo’s Pumpkin Farm.

By T.H. Pearce
Published: The State, Oct. 15, 1971, Volume 39, Number 10, Page 10

Half way between Raleigh and Rocky Mount, an attractive brick home sits about one hundred yards off busy Highway US 64, in the midst of one of North Carolina’s best tobacco growing sections. This isn’t the home of just another prosperous tobacco farmer however, but the farm home of Elmo Tant, known locally as The Pumpkin Man.

Tant is one of those farmers who took the advice about diversified farming quite literally a few years ago and started looking for crops other than the usual cotton, corn and tobacco to grow on his Franklin County acreage. Having grown pumpkins, more or less as a hobby, it was only natural that he decided to go into it on a larger scale.

The venture was a success from the start. The land devoted to the gourd and pumpkin crop has increased every year until the 1971 growing season saw twenty-four acres planted in pumpkins and two acres in gourds. His production methods have proved so successful with the crop that he has harvested one pumpkin that tipped the scales at 210 pounds and giant gourds that go over fifty pounds. Pumpkins of this size, while spectacular and good for publicity purposes are really too large for much commercial use. After all, just how many kids could manage a 210 pound jack-o-lantern on Halloween?

While his top size specimens have been grown from seeds of his own hybridizing experiments, known as the Big T variety, Tant is currently experimenting with cross breeding to develop a good shape and color along with a more marketable size. His 1971 crop gave ample evidence that his experiments are succeeding.

Not too many years ago, pumpkins were considered to be mainly a crop of the northern states, but the Franklin County farmer reasoned that there was no reason why they couldn’t be gown equally as well or even better in North Carolina soil. Nor one can argue with this point of view after a visit to his farm.

The large growing varieties are spaced eight feet apart in every other row, while the small growing ones, such as Sugar Pie, used for cooking purposes are planted four feet apart. They are planted in the richest possible soil, fed with one thousand pounds of fertilizer per acre and irrigated regularly. Much water is needed during the growing season, but a dry harvest period is preferred. Harvesting is usually started September fifteenth and goes on until Thanksgiving. The bulk of the crop is brought in during the month of October, with the busiest time being understandably the two weeks prior to Halloween.

Largest customer for Tant’s crop for the past several years has been a man from Florida who sends for his supply in huge tractor trailer rigs of the same type used to haul watermelons from that state in a different season.

As is getting to be the case with so many businessmen and farmers, labor is one of the Pumpkin Man’s largest problems. Six men work at harvest time and as Mr. Tant puts it, “If you want some extra help to load trucks, they usually don’t come back the second day.” A look at the pile of pumpkins in the fifty to seventy-five pound class makes this easy to understand. It is easy to imagine the back breaking task involved in loading them all day. He is now toying with the idea of developing some sort of mechanically operated sling to ease the task of gathering and loading the crop.

One would-be customer, the owner of a chain of businesses across the sate, put in an order for 90 tons, which was regretfully turned down. “He wanted little ones to give away at his business locations during the pre-Halloween season and there just wasn’t enough of the size he wanted.”

The ornamental gourd section of his operation is also on the increase. While gourds of many types and sizes are grown, it is these brightly colored small ones that catch the eye of the visitors to “Elmo’s Pumpkin Farm,” which incidentally is the official name of the establishment. They are much in demand to be used in fall arrangements that have become so popular in recent years.

Tant states that he hasn’t yet given up all of his other farming interests and still grows seven acres of tobacco, but it is easy to see where his real interest in the world of farming lies. Whether or not he will increase his pumpkin acreage depends largely on the labor situation.

So far as the market for pumpkins is concerned, thus far the supply has failed to keep up with demand, as evidenced by his having to turn down an order for ninety tons, but he has certainly proved that there are other money crops besides those traditionally considered as such in Eastern North Carolina.