Abandoned Yankee Siege - Greenfield, NH

What started as a way to attract more visitors to his pumpkin stand ended with an entry in the records books. In 2004, Steve Seigars' homemade trebuchet, a catapult tosser named the Yankee Siege, launched a pumpkin 1,394 feet as a first time entrant in the annual "Punkin Chunkin" competition in Bridgeville, Delaware. Seigars and his team returned for several years thereafter, bettering their own record to an eventual 2,835', in 2013. Other pumpkin tossers reached distances of a mile or more, but those were air cannons or other styles. In the category of trebuchet, the Yankee Siege stands on top.

The news section of the Siege's website has it's last entry as the record toss from 2013, and since that year the site has gone quiet - both the website and seemingly the physical property, at least on the day I was there. And although its top half has been removed, the giant wheeled-base of Yankee Siege still stands on display in the field.

I visited the Yankee Siege in the summer of 2019, and right from the entrance this place was one photo opportunity after another. These giant gates are the first thing to greet you as you enter. I didn't have my wife to pose in the picture for size perspective, but fortunately my bicycle was of equal height and able to serve the same purpose.

Seigars didn't just make these gates decorative, he made them functional. Walk around the backside and you'll find a door at the base of each tower.

Inside these doors were steel rungs, and they had just enough of a metal over rust ratio for me to risk the climb up.

I spent several minutes on top of the tower, enjoying snacks while ducking out of sight from the occasional vehicle.

Back when it was active, the Yankee Siege would put on shows chucking all things large and small. Couches, refrigerators, even cars were great way to demonstrate the muscle of Yankee Siege, and to show off the distance it could throw a pumpkin, Seigars built a castle out in the field as a target. I climbed down from my perch to go have a look.

Back when it was open to visitors, this drawbridge and the path leading up to it were beautifully landscaped and pumpkin-lined. Now, they are overrun by weeds and brush.

Eight people are credited with taking part in the Siege's construction, and they sure had a good time making the castle. Each of its towers has a chamber beneath it, and each of these chambers has a different painted scene.

Each of these chambers also has a steel ladder leading up, so you know what came next.

From on high, I was able to overlook the castle's entire courtyard, but a bees nest soon chased me back down.

But not before I had time to capture the ever elusive dragon-selfie.

Outside the castle a short tunnel leads underneath it, but not to any dungeons or torture chambers. These small rooms mostly just hold old props.

Although the castle was built 600 feet from where Yankee Siege stood, the trebuchet was tossing pumpkins in some cases twice that distance. That led to the construction of this tower at the very edge of the field.

A fake door was painted in the front of the tower, but a real door was in the rear. I was excited to climb up, but only until I saw that it was locked.

I kicked myself later, though, because after going through my pictures and zooming in, it looked like the chain was only draped over the locking arm, not through it.

One last really cool thing out here is this 10,000 pound spiked mace. As part of entertaining the public, Seigars would drop this beast onto cars or anything else that had outlived its useful life.

In recent years, the official Punpkin Chunkin competition that Yankee Siege once dominated has not taken place. 2014 and 2015 contests were cancelled due to logistical and insurance issues. In 2016 the event took place, but an air-cannon exploded and seriously injured a television producer, contributing to the 2017 and 2018 events getting canned. But the World Championship Punkin Chunkin (WCPC) non-profit that organizes this event announced recently that the chunkin will resume in 2019, and it starts today, November 2nd.

And soon we will find out, whether Yankee Siege's 2,835 foot trebuchet record will stand for another year.



Fun Links:

History of Yankee Siege and a video exploration, by WeRmudfun - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-0BJ2ldFio

Yankee Siege tosses a piano - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_NJC7bCxxd4