ASHFIELD — Twelve-year-old Ellia Masenior peeped out from behind eight pumpkins in her strained arms, hardly able to see in front of her, but trusting her legs to know the way around the zucchini stanchion and back to the finish line.
People watching from the sidelines shrieked as dropped pumpkins came tumbling across the Town Common, but then helped to replenish Ellia’s arms with pumpkins again.
“She will not give up!” announcer Chris Rawlings said of Ellia, of Northampton. “That’s the spirit of the Pumpkin Games!”
The Pumpkin Games, now in their 29th year, are one of the crowd favorites of the Ashfield Fall Festival, held Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Still, Pumpkin Games Commissioner Dick Evans broke from tradition, incorporating live music by the Ashfield Community Band’s “pumpkin ensemble” into the Pumpkin Games’ version of musical chairs.
“Live music adds life to everything, and it makes the band an actual participant in the Pumpkin Games as well,” Evans said.
Evans was thankful the games went off without a hitch once again, given a “zucchini crisis” that had organizers putting out a call for the summer squash.
“Typically we don’t have a problem,” he said. “Zucchini usually find us before we find them. … But Ashfield comes through with zucchini when you need it.”
The Pumpkin Games weren’t the only quirky games at the 49th annual festival. Elsewhere on the common, children tried to catapult a ball over a wooden replica of a castle and toss a roll of toilet paper into a toilet. Meanwhile, adults milled elbow-to-elbow through crafters’ tents.
Watching her grandchildren play games was one of 67-year-old Terry Taylor’s favorite parts of the Ashfield Fall Festival. Terry Taylor was visiting from Petersburgh, N.Y. for the occasion, and had never been to the festival before.
“This is for the old and the young,” she said.
Next to Terry was her brother-in-law Mert Taylor Sr., one of the family members she was visiting. Mert Taylor, 73, of Plainfield, recounted coming to the festival since its beginning, and being a fan of the tag sales that were scattered across town.
“They’ve always got something to remind you of when you were a kid,” he said.
“Sometimes it’s some stupid little thing that costs a dime, but you’ve been looking for one for years,” agreed Jim Kelsey, 73, of Greenfield.
Seated next to each other, Kelsey and Mert Taylor acted as if they’d known each other for years, joking and laughing together. In reality, the two had just met when they happened to sit next to each other.
“There’s always new people,” said Kelsey, who said he’s attended the festival for over 10 years. “We really enjoy it up here.”
While some met there for the first time, the festival served as a reunion for others, like Paul Abbott, 64, of Holyoke. Abbott said he started coming to the festival 15 years ago to catch up with his Ashfield friends, and came to love the food — much of which supports causes like St. John’s Church, the Sanderson Academy Parent-Teacher Organization and the local Boy Scout troop — as well as the foliage and country atmosphere.
“It’s a simple, kind of old-fashioned, fun activity,” he said. “It just has a certain charm.”
Reach Shelby Ashline at: sashline@recorder.com
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