Question: Which town is known as the Pumpkin Capital of Texas?
Answer: Floydada, a town of about 2,500 northeast of Lubbock. According to legend, Spanish explorer Francisco Vázquez de Coronado survived on pumpkins cultivated by local tribes in the 1540s. In the 1950s, farmer B.A. “Uncle Slim” Robertson started cultivating pumpkins on a few acres and selling them from a roadside stand. By the early 1990s, Floydada’s annual production peaked at 20 million pumpkins. Today, farmers produce about two million a year.
In the 1980s, Floydada trademarked the slogan “Pumpkin Capital of the United States,” and it began hosting the annual Punkin Day festival on the second Saturday in October. In 2013, the state legislature designated Floydada as the Pumpkin Capital of Texas.
