Pumpkin Festival Background Information
The Half Moon Bay Beautification Committee
In 1970, the Main Street Committee for Beautification was appointed by the Half Moon Bay City Council to launch a massive “paint-in" and tree-planting program as part of an extensive downtown restoration program. The committee consisted of a group of civic minded citizens who wanted to make a lasting contribution to the preservation and beautification of the town's historic Main Street.
 In order to raise funds for their projects, they inaugurated what became the Art & Pumpkin Festival. Since the festival's inception, the committee has contributed more than $2.5 million dollars to various civic projects and community service organizations. Some of the Main Street projects funded by the committee at no cost to the city have included: the renovation of City Hall, the painting of historic buildings, the installation of old-fashioned street lights and wooden benches, the underground wiring of Main Street, the planting of trees and flower beds, the construction of Mac Dutra and Kitty Fernandez Parks, and the purchase of garbage receptacles and Christmas lights. Additionally, the committee spends thousands of dollars every year in the on-going maintenance of Main Street. They plant fresh flowers, re-furbish benches, and pay someone to clean up and sweep Main Street every week.
This year, $85,000 was awarded to non-profit, school and city agencies. Among the recipients: Senior Coastsiders, Coastside Adult Day Health Center, I.D.E.S. Society, Coastal Repertory Theater, San Mateo County Sheriff Explorers Program, Coastside RotaCare Clinic, Coastal Arts League, City of Half Moon Bay Police Department PAL program, Coastside Adult Day Health Center, Senior Coastsiders, Half Moon Bay High School Grad Night, No Strings Attached Breakfast, Sonrisas Communty Dental Clinic, Seton Medical Center, Young Actors Workshop, Boys & Girls Club of the Coastside, and Half Moon Bay High School student scholarships.
Festival a Civic Undertaking
The festival is a huge civic effort. Some thirty-five non-profit and community service groups participate in the festival by operating food and game booths. For most, the festival is their most lucrative fund-raising event of the year, enabling them to raise a substantial portion of their annual budget from the two-day festival. An estimated $400,000 was raised by local community service groups from food, beverage, game and parking sales at last year’s Pumpkin Festival. By providing this opportunity for the non-profit sector, the Pumpkin Festival helps to perpetuate “giving" in the community, no small feat for a town without a base of large corporate donors.
The Pumpkin Industry on the Coast
Every autumn, thousands of Bay Area residents visit the coastside to pick pumpkins from the picturesque fields along Highways 1 and 92. More than 3,000 tons of pumpkins are grown each year by 15 or so commercial growers in the Half Moon Bay area. They ship pumpkins all over the United States and sell to many of the large retailers in the Bay Area. As always, this year there's a bumper crop.
The pumpkin boom can be traced back to growers in the area who began to plant pumpkins in the 1930's. In the early 30’s, teenager John Arata and his brother Clarence began planting pumpkin seeds to feed the family’s hogs. One day, they were hauling some of their pumpkins along Highway One back to the farm when a passing motorist stopped and asked if he could buy a few. The Arata’s sold the pumpkins for a quarter and a booming pumpkin-picking business and tourist attraction was born.
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