2008: Festival Facts

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Sentinel Staff
The Keene Sentinel
published 10/23/2008

For the last 16 years, downtown Keene has been painted in a palette of earthy orange hues for one weekend in October.

Last year, 25,644 pumpkins decorated the streets during the annual Pumpkin Festival — but this is just one of a range of numbers that have come to describe the festival.

Through the years, Center Stage Cheshire County, the organizers of the event, have put together some “pumpkin lore.” The facts and figures below were provided by the organization:

About 70,000 people are expected to crowd into Keene Saturday to revel in the festivities.
The first festival, called Harvest Festival, featured 600 pumpkins. Since then, a total of 282,176 pumpkins have graced the streets of Keene.
About 1,000 costumed children took part in the Costume Parade at the festival last year.
Nonprofit organizations took in more than $200,000 in donations in 2007.
The largest pumpkin ever displayed, weighing in at a hefty 1,300 pounds, was brought by Cheshire Medical Center/Dartmouth-Hitchcock Keene.
Two weddings are planned during this year’s festival, including a couple from England.
Thirty-four craft vendors and 45 food vendors will line the streets at this year’s festival.
More than 800 volunteers donate their time to the festival, doing everything from logging and moving pumpkins to directing traffic and cleaning up.
Clean-up crews begin at 5 a.m. on Sunday and work until every trace of the gourd-filled festivities are gone, usually by around noon.