But competitors in the
Punkin Chunkin contest use pumpkins weighing 3.6 to 4.5 kg (8 to 10 lbs) for the adult classes; the youth competitors hurl pumpkins that are no less than 1.8 kg (4 lbs).
The
Punkin Patch website is also handy for unusual gifts.
Aunt Cat recalls when she would nurse the infant Lilburne and "Sing fer the moon to skeer the Bugaboo, / Sing fer the Cher-kee never come not nigh / To skeer my
punkin Little Baby-Bear, / And no Raw-Head-and-Bloody-Bones to come" (BTD79, 40).
For what I have come to learn about Ojibwe pedagogy, I am grateful to the following Elders and teachers at White Earth: Charles "
Punkin" Hanks, Ethelbert Vanwert, Joe Legarde, Dan Kier, Erma Vizenor, the late Jack Potter, the late Josephine DeGroat, and especially the late Larry Cloud Morgan.
along Colorado highway 94 from Aroya to
Punkin Center (Fitzgerald et al.
"There's a
punkin! Where's the face?" she exclaims.
Back in Canada Thorson's "
Punkin head" became the poster bear of Canada's baby boom generation through Eaton's popularization of it.
One wild one is the
Punkin Chunkin Festival in Lewes, Delaware.
Wichita County: no specific locality, two specimens (1199 & 11175); 2.7 mi ENE of Kamay, one specimen (18137); 3 mi N of Iowa Park, one specimen (11174); 1 mi S of Iowa Park, one specimen (15441); near Iowa Park, one specimen (19517); 6 mi NE of
Punkin Center, one specimen (19215); 10 mi S of Electra, one specimen (19512); 10 mi S of Burkburnett, one specimen (13379); 10 mi W of Wichita Falls, one specimen (18214); 2 mi W of Wichita Falls, one specimen (15440); Wichita Falls, 10 specimens (1201, 1274, 1465, 1729, 7208, 10984, 17046, 19214, 19514 & 19518).
His best-known poems include "When the Frost Is on the
Punkin," Little Orphant Annie, "The Raggedy Man," and "An Old Sweetheart of Mine." His poems were collected in Complete Works, 10 vol.
Riley's most popular poem was "When the Frost is on the
Punkin." When the frost is on the
punkin and the fodder's in the shock, And you hear the kyouck and gobble of the struttin' turkey-cock And the clackin' of the guineys, and the cluckin' of the hens, And the rooster's hallylooyer as he tiptoes on the fence; O, it's then's the times a feller is a-feelin' at his best, With the risin' sun to greet him from a night of peaceful rest, As he leaves the house, bareheaded, and goes out to feed the stock, When the frost is on the
punkin and the fodder's in the shock.
He is remembered for his dialect poems, among them Little Orphant Annie, The Raggedy Man, and " When the Frost Is on the
Punkin " (1883), which have been called " comforting, familiar platitudes restated in verse.
"They's something kindo' harty-like about the atmusfere / When the heat of summer's over and the coolin' fall is here - / Of course we miss the flowers, and the blossums on the trees, / And the mumble of the hummin'-birds and buzzin' of the bees; / But the air's so appetizin'; and the landscape through the haze / Of a crisp and sunny morning of the airly autumn days / Is a pictur' that no painter has the colorin' to mock - / When the frost is on the
punkin and the fodder's in the shock." - James Whitcomb Riley
* Lace-up romper, $65; Tom Girl bootie, $112
PUNKIN PATCH