Rossville

Tall Corn Festival

Sponsored by: Rossville Community Development Committee

2009

Festival Recap

"Corn Gone Wild"

August 7, 8, 9, 2009

ARTICLE: "Corn grown, spit and eaten"

Tall Corn Festival begins with fun contests, including corn-spitting event

By: Bill Blankenship / Topeka Capital-Journal

Appeared: August 7, 2009 / www.cjonline.com

ROSSVILLE -- The shortest student at Rossville High School spit her kernel of corn the farthest of all her classmates in opening night competition of the Tall Corn Festival.

Kelsey Johnson, 17, said she amazed herself when she tossed her head back, puckered her lips and blew a corn kernel 24 feet 9 inches to win the high school division of the festival's corn-spitting contest.

"That really surprised me," said Kelsey, who didn't even plan on entering the contest because she and other high school cheerleaders were staffing the event. However, when there weren't too many contestants, she and the other Bulldog cheerleaders joined the competition.

At 4 feet, 10 inches, Kelsey recorded a spit of more than 5 times her height, but said after the contest she wasn't sure whether the achievement will make it alongside her other accomplishments in the yearbook when she graduates next May.

The diminutive cheerleader's 24-foot-9 spit was better than that of some male high school athletes, a point made by the emcee over the loud speakers at the Joe Campbell Memorial Stadium where the contest was staged. Her expectoration even bested a lot of the contestants in the adult division, but not that of Danny Davis whose kernel landed 38 feet 8 inches from where it left his lips.

The other winners of the corn-spitting were: ages 3 to 6, Kaden Brown, 6 feet 4 inches; ages 7 to 9, Tyler Swaffer, 17 feet 2 inches; and ages 10 to 12, Garnett Miller, 20 feet 1 inch.

Corn-spitting wasn't the only maize-related event settled in Campbell Stadium.

The tall corn contest was won by 95-year-old Berniece French with a 12-foot-8½-inch stalk, but then French knows a thing or two about growing corn as she has done it for decades. She said her late husband, Howard, was one of the originators of the Tall Corn Festival. The winner of the tall corn contest's youth division was Derek Gentry with a 13-foot stalk.

If they so choose, Derek and French will be grand marshals of the festival parades Saturday, with the children's parade stepping off at 9:45 a.m. followed at 10 a.m. by the grand parade, both of which will be on Main Street.

Brandon Bergstresser repeated as champion corn eater by scarfing down the kernels from three ears of corn before any of the other adult male competitors. Rossville Councilwoman Angi Thomas won the women's division despite interference from city police officer Mary Zimmerman in the good-natured competition.

The other corn-eating contest winners, by category, were: ages 3 to 6, Layne Hurla; ages 7 to 9, Kody Hurla; ages 10 to 12, Eliana Jacobsen and Nicholas VanderPutten, who tied even after an eat-off; junior high, Melodie Shastall; and high school, Michael VanderPutten. Kristen Brown won a special competition against other life guards at the Rossville Community Pool, improvements to which will be formally dedicated Sunday afternoon.

This article can be viewed at:

http://cjonline.com/news/2009-08-07/corn_grown_spit_and_eaten