Josephine Is The Last Melon Standing
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Hal Vaughn (center) won first place Saturday in an Arkansas weigh-in with his 270.8 pound melon. Kenny Crawford (right) of Missouri won second with a 262.7 pound melon and Garrin Bratcher (left) of Oklahoma took third with a 224.6 pounder.
It has been a great summer for watermelon lore in Water Valley with a new carnival record and a new state record and it’s not over. Josephine, Allen Roger’s giant melon, is still growing and could rival a new state record set by Hal Vaughn last weekend.
We will get to Josephine later, as the limelight is now on Hal Vaughn. Vaughn has won three watermelon contests this year starting with Water Valley’s Watermelon Carnival last month. Vaughn’s 219.6 pound melon was the biggest ever entered in the Watermelon Carnival contest, easily taking first place. He took that same melon to the Franklin County Watermelon Festival in Alabama two weeks later and claimed another first place finish.
Last Thursday, Vaughn pulled his biggest melon ever. We weighed it Friday morning and it was an amazing 271 pounds. He had hoped that it would continue to grow until mid-September and he could enter it in the Great Pumpkin Pursuit and Watermelon Weigh-off at Roberts Family Farm in Guston, Ky. But Vaughn said the stem was getting soft and he had to go ahead and pull it.
It worked out, he was able to make a 300-mile trip Saturday to Arkansas for the 14th Annual Old Washington Farmers Market Watermelon Weighoff where he claimed another first place win against stiff competition.
Vaughn initially thought he was in trouble as a Missouri grower had a bigger melon, based on outside measurements. Vaughn explained that each watermelon was measured and the weigh-in started with the smallest melons.
Vaughn’s melon was weighed next-to-last behind the Missouri melon and it weighed 270.8 pounds on the digital scales – the weight that will be certified as the new Mississippi record.
Next came the melon grown by Kenny Crawford of Hornersville, Mo. Crawford’s melon weighed 262.7 pounds, making it the second place melon behind Vaughn. He explained that even though the Missouri melon was larger, it had a hollow spot inside.
Saturday’s weigh-in was a historic day as Vaughn’s 270.8 pound melon is the new Mississippi record and Crawford’s 262.7 pound melon is the new Missouri state record.
Now we are down to Josephine, Rogers’ melon that is reportedly still growing. Rogers, who has a scale rigged under the melon, has not divulged the weight but it is no secret that Josephine is a strong contender for another new record in Mississippi. Barring any problems, Rogers is going to pull the watermelon around Sept. 19 and take it to the Kentucky contest. Stay tuned, we will keep you updated on this final weigh-in of the season.
Both Rogers and Vaughn are already planning for next year’s big watermelons. They were able to up their game this year after Rogers learned how to graft watermelons, a tactic used by some of the top growers in the nation. Rogers grafted watermelon seedlings, attaching each one to a bushel gourd vine. The gourd vine gives each seedling a bigger root system to draw nutrients to feed the watermelon.
The grafted melons helped both men up the weights on their melons and you can bet are looking for another great year in 2025.
While Vaughn and Rogers ruled this year, don’t rule out Kenny Harmon. Harmon had a strong showing in Water Valley’s contest with a 196.1 pounder that took second place. Harmon says he is figuring on grafting a watermelon to a kudzu vine, and his main concern is finding a tractor big enough to load it!
