The student team with senior physics majors Fred Ciesla, left, and Jon Branscomb tie off the end of their weather balloon which, equipped with a drill and a "pumpkin cam," was directed to the top of McGraw Tower on March 4 for a sample of the famous pumpkin. Nicola Kountoupes/University Photography
Two teams of Cornell undergraduates last week became the first contestants to breach the university's mysterious pumpkin.
On March 4, the first group -- four senior physics majors -- used modern technology and Rube Goldberg ingenuity (and also followed investigatory rules set up by the university provost) to get a sample of the alleged pumpkin, which was first discovered perched atop the university's 173-foot-tall McGraw Tower more than five months ago.
The students discussed the difficulty they had in obtaining a sample of the enigmatic pumpkin. "It was hard to drill, that's for sure," said Samuel J. Laroque of Santa Cruz, Calif.
Enterprising undergraduates have until today to make other close encounters of the pumpkin kind for the university-sponsored contest, designed to get an answer (no climbing or flying allowed) to the gourd's composition. Friday, Provost Don Randel will be hoisted in a bucket by a crane to obtain an official sample of the pumpkin and determine the contest winner.
The team of physics majors got their sample, as well as a close-up video of the moment, by sending up an 8-foot weather balloon, equipped with a serrated drill bit chuck-keyed into a motor, mounted on a platform with a JVC camcorder -- "pumpkin cam" -- and stereo wire to transmit information from sky to ground. The contraption was tethered, using the horsepower of three evenly placed students on the ground.
"I was just hoping I was going to get my camcorder back," said Jon Branscomb of Healdsburg, Calif. He had purchased it two years ago with the help of his grandmother and his father -- so, before he and his friends sent the camcorder aloft, "I put a bunch of padding around it," he said.
Branscomb and Laroque were joined by Eldar Noe, a planetary sciences major from Santiago, Chile, and Fred Ciesla, a physics major from Sturbridge, Mass., in designing the flying probe.
Over the next two days, a materials science and mechanical engineering team made attempts at gaining a sample of the pumpkin with a tubed mace, also sent aloft by a weather balloon.
The second team, made up of Jeff Valentine, a senior from Rochester, N.Y.; Emily Winston, a sophomore from Old Bridge, N.J.; Bruce Wu, a sophomore from Studio City, Calif.; Chris Regan, a junior from Avon, Conn.; Andrew Lu, a senior from Mays Landing, N.J.; Ed Hutchins, a junior from Groton, Conn.; and 15 other students, made their first attempt March 5. High winds prevented their probe from getting near the peak the first day, but they tried again the next morning and were successful.
While the teams were carrying on their quests, other students, faculty and administrators also were joining in the spirit of pumpkin mania. On March 5, they were joined on campus by an ABC-TV News team with reporter Bill Blakemore, producer Elissa Rubin and a camera crew to film the pumpkin-probing attempts and also gain insight from Randel; Margaret K. Jahn, associate professor of plant breeding; Michael Macy, professor of sociology; and the Rev. Robert Johnson, director of Cornell United Religious Work.
The network news crew also recorded the Cornell Chorus and Glee Club singing a spirited and revised version of the alma mater -- complete with pumpkin lyrics adapted by Evangeline Ray. ABC aired the two-minute, 42-second segment during its evening news report on Saturday.
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