Valley’s history rife with gigantic cabbages

PALMER — Is there anything more quintessentially Alaskan than the Giant Cabbage Weigh-off?

The giant cabbage contest is such a staple of the Alaska State Fair — itself a staple of Alaska culture — that it’s featured in nearly every write-up of the fair in any publication.

Most recently, the giant veggies got attention from National Public Radio, which ran a story titled, “Why Vegetables Get Freakish in the Land of the Midnight Sun” a week ago.

It’s a vegetable weigh-in that has become a spectator sport. There’s a “Cabbage Classic” weight-guessing charity raffle — entry for which closes at 3 p.m., Friday, by the way.

The cabbages have their own cheerleaders — the Cabbage Fairies — who have sort of spun off on their own, showing up all over the Valley at other, non-cabbage events year-round.

Cabbages: a history

The story of the giant cabbage is steeped in folklore. According to the Alaska State Fair website, the first cabbage contest was in 1941 when the manager of the Alaska Railroad donated $25 to the person who could grow the biggest cabbage.

The winner then was Max Sherrod, according to the fair’s account. Sherrod, one of the Valley’s founding fathers whose name also graces Sherrod Elementary in Palmer, turned in a 23-pound cabbage that year.

But, actually, according to the Palmer Museum, cabbages have always been a staple of the fair. In 1936 the prize for biggest cabbage was $2, dropping to $1 the next year, the museum notes on its website.

The fair has been a mainstay of Frontiersman news coverage from its very first issue Sept. 17 1947, which featured a photo of a local woman in front of 32 types of preserves, which the paper dubbed “32 examples of the kitchen ability of Mrs. Fannie Werner.”

Cabbages were also there from the very start. A Frontiersman article from October 1947 contains a shot of high school sophomore Helen Mae Stenvall handing a gigantic cabbage from Sherrod’s garden to Col. John P. Johnson, the Alaska Railroad’s general manager. One issue later, a local farmer, William Hoskins, is seen in a photo showing his produce — chief among them, a cabbage — to Seattle residents.

Talis Colberg, director of Mat-Su College and a professor of history, said that what we think of as the cabbage weigh-off — a stand-alone contest with spectators and sponsorships and world record-sized vegetables — is in its 19th year.

“There was always kind of a vegetable category and the best cabbage always won, but it wasn’t a specific separate contest until 1996,” Colberg said.

He said the idea for a giant cabbage contest came from Joe Lawton, who was working in marketing at the fair and would go on to become its general manager.

Lawton had attended the Big E Fair in Massachusetts and seen that state’s giant pumpkin contest.

“It actually worked. It gained attention for the fair, it’s become a signature event,” Colberg said.

It as also Lawton’s wife Ginny who came up with the idea for the Cabbage Fairies, sketched their first costumes, and recruiter her friends to join her.

Why cabbages?

So, that’s all well and good, but why cabbages? Just last week, for instance, the fair had its own giant pumpkin weigh-off. The winning entrant, Dale Marshall, submitted a gourd just three pounds shy of a world record, tipping the scales at more than 1,283.5 pounds.

The current record holder for giant cabbages, Scott Robb, submitted a 138.25-pounder to claim that honor, two years ago. The pumpkins are so much bigger.

“We have this history of the giant vegetables that had kind of been out there for awhile,” Colberg said in explaining why it’s cabbages and not some other type of produce.

Robb himself was quoted last year in a story on the Alaska State Fair’s website saying that cabbages are kind of unique.

“When a cabbage decides it’s time to grow, it’s exponential. It’s like a switch turns on, and it grows. That’s why people are so fascinated,” Robb said.

In an interview Thursday, he said that cabbages are a natural pick for the Valley because they grow so well here.

The allure of giant heads

Regardless of why the fair picked cabbages to be its signature event, the appeal for current contestants is pretty obvious. The fair’s Crops Supervisor, Kathy Liska, summed it up in one word:

“Notoriety: to have a Guinness World Record is awesome.”

Colberg, who continues to compete and continues to believe he might one day win — despite all evidence to the contrary — said the event is a truly an Alaskan spectacle.

“Who else can have a giant cabbage, giant vegetables across the board?” he said. “That makes the fair a unique thing… It’s a unique fair and this is part of it and it’s kind of neat to be a part of it.”

Robb said he’ll probably grow cabbages until he dies.

“You know when they grow early on before they start to form a head they’re just like a gigantic green rose, they’re picturesque, they’re flower-like,” he said.

This year’s contest

In the most recent weigh-offs, Robb and another competitor, Steve Hubacek, have kind of been the dominant competitors, trading off wins to push the World Record higher. Robb is only the current record holder because he bested Hubacek’s record entry from 2009.

Prior to the Hubacek/Robb years, the contest was mostly a Dinkel affair, with two brothers — Gene and Don Dinkel — blowing away the competition with 80- and 90-pounders. Another Dinkel — Keevan, just 10 years old at the time but related to Gene and Don — won last year.

For the top competitors, the weigh-in is the culmination of a week of weighings. They hold back their biggest heads until the last day but bring in smaller ones as they go.

“Yesterday I bested Steve by two tenths of a pound,” Robb said.

He predicts stiff head-to-head competition this year.

Why cabbages? (redux)

So how does a spectacle like this become a spectator sport? What is there to watch, really, in a cabbage weigh-off? How is it that the event has grandstand bleachers full of fans?

For some, like Lauren Guinotte — an up-and-coming cabbage grower — said in an Alaska State Fair article from 2013, it’s the science that’s interesting. Growers keep notes to maintain consistency and keep track of what the cabbages are eating. They use special plastic liners and raised beds to warm up the soil.

Liska noted that the growing conditions in Alaska — lots of sunlight — are good for this kind of thing, but there are genetics at work as well.

“When you get into world records, that’s specific seed that’s been developed to make those large vegetables,” she said.

But even on event day, after the science has played its role, there actually is something to watch besides Boy Scouts lifting tarps holding giant cabbages and the growers biting their nails. There really is a drama there.

“There is some uncertainty about what the size will be, who actually will get it,” Colberg said. “There’s some deception at play in the appearance in that you can look at a cabbage and think you know how much it weighs but you don’t.”

Contact Andrew Wellner at 352-2270 or andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com.