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The little town of Half Moon Bay has become the pumpkin capital of California. Each year about 6, 000 tons of this unusual fruit are raised and shipped as far as Hawaii and the east coast of the United States. Yet pumpkins were first grown in the town only in 1934, when a nine-year-old boy planted a few seeds and grew a crop of his own. Now they are such big business that Half Moon Bay holds a pumpkin festival in fall every year and there are more than 10, 000 visitors. Farmers work all summer to try to grow the biggest pumpkins in the world, and thousands of visitors come to help harvest them.
The festival is held at the same time with Halloween at the end of October. Children all over the country make Jack-O’-lanterns(南瓜灯)out of pumpkins by emptying them, carving faces in them and putting candles inside. The insides of the pumpkins can then be used to make delicious pies. The Indians of the eastern United States had been eating pumpkins long before the first settlers arrived. But this food was not introduced in Europe until the 1500s, when the Spanish explorers brought some back from Mexico—where they were first grown some 8, 000 years ago.
