Harvest Fest is a large kick off to fall event that Waynesburg University does each year, but the biggest, and most popular activity during the festival, is pumpkin bowling. 

Pumpkin Bowling is an event that has been put on by the Waynesburg University radio station, WCYJ-FM every year since the early ‘90s, but due to COVID-19 the event took quite a hit. 

This year, Richard Krause, chairman of the Department of Communications, plans to bring this event back to life this year on Oct. 27. 

“We are trying to do it at even a higher level this year. I want to see greater engagement with the student community here on campus,” Krause said. “I would like to get a larger crowd to attend it because it is fun when the crowd is loud and rowdy and rooting for particular people.”

In previous years, Pumpkin Bowling was a large event that received national coverage. Jordan Thompson, a Waynesburg University alumni, explained some of the national coverage he experienced when he was the general manager of the radio station.  

“In 2008, it was an election year. The local elections were being held and it was a heated race,” Thompson said. “We reached out to both camps and asked them if they wanted some free press leading up to the election just by being a part of our event. And we got (national) coverage from that.”

Along with the national coverage, Pumpkin Bowling received in Thompson’s years, there were a few major differences to the event. 

“It was always kind of lowkey even before COVID and it was kind of lame I thought. So, I thought let’s make it the thing to do on campus tonight,” Thompson said. “So, everyone came out and had a great time, so we did back-to-back years at night.”

Gwyneth Napier, current general manager for the radio station, hopes to bring back the excitement for the event like in Thompson’s years.

“We want to try and make different teams from each different department, so we hope to have teams from every department,” Napier said. “We want to make it almost an elimination thing to see who will move on in the bowling.”

More involvement and bringing back Pumpkin Bowling to the massive event it used to be, is the main goal for not only Krause, but Napier too.

“I want President Lee to be on a team. I want to have a team aspect this year, through working with the student leadership team we have this year,” Napier said. “And just encouraging students to come out and watch Pumpkin Bowling.” 

Although more involvement is a high priority, Krause explained that the main goal is to make students more aware of the radio station here on campus. 

“The goal is to promote the radio station. For the students to know, number 1, that there is a radio station here and it is very active on campus,” Krause said. “To let the general student body know that they have a radio station.”

Krause said that some nice weather would be appreciated.

“It would be awesome to have beautiful weather,” Krause said. “It’s difficult to control the pumpkins on a wet day.”