Pumpkin Races, Festivals Span Midwest

Several communities marked the Halloween season with pumpkin races, runs and family events. In southwest Missouri, the Joplin Roadrunners’ 43rd annual Pumpkin Run offered distances from one mile to 10 miles and aimed to raise about $6,000 for scholarships for children with disabilities. Carbondale’s Great Pumpkin Race paired decorated, wheeled pumpkins in age- and organization-based heats, with proceeds from its featured race benefiting the Science Center and Read SI; four-year-old Olen Feather won the final. Naperville’s 10th annual Pumpkin Race brought racers to Rotary Hill, with pumpkin-racing kits assembled by Turning Pointe Autism Foundation students as vocational training, while the city’s Halloween Hop offered downtown trick-or-treating and trolley rides. Alhambra’s October 25 Pumpkin Run and Halloween Festival features several race distances, children’s activities and business-to-business trick-or-treating, with proceeds benefiting the Alhambra Educational Foundation.