Pardeeville Watermelon Festival

Thank you for visiting our website. We hope you visit our festival this year and enjoy yourselves. Bring your family and friends.

A little history

These “watermelon games” were begun one evening after a meeting of the Pardeeville Businessmen’s Association. They were having an after-meeting “social hour” at Bob Merwin’s Long Branch Saloon. Present were R. H. “Hoot” Thompson, Ray Bankers, Bob Merwin, Bob Williams, Merwin Smith, Herb Kampen, Ken Gavinski, and a few others.

Talk began with a general discussion of having an event to put Pardeeville on the map. This was to be a fun filled day, cheap and easy for the sponsors and relatively free of cost for those who attended.

Photo by William R Winter – Rio, WI — 1970 Pardeeville Watermelon Festival

They talked (and drank) and laughed, and the outcome of the evening was five weeks later when the first Pardeeville Watermelon Festival was held. The first Spitting event was held on the old cement platform next to the Frog Pond in Chandler Park. The first eating contest was held on the tennis courts.

The second year, the two events changed locations, and have been held at their respective sites until ten years ago. The first coordinators of the events were “Hoot” Thompson and his son Steve in seed-spitting, and Bob Williams and David Fitzgerald in the speed-eating events.

Over the years, new events have been added such as Largest Watermelon contest, open to all local growers. There is a Watermelon Carving contest as well where competitors use their skills to create works of art.

Photo by William R Winter – Rio, WI — 1970 Pardeeville Watermelon Festival

In 2018, we held our 50th festival to one of our largest crowds ever!

Over the last fifteen years, the festival has grown steadily with dedicated volunteers from the Pardeeville area, and groups like the Pardeeville Lions Club and the Pardeeville High School Student Council, plus fantastic sponsors financially supporting the festival to bring a family friendly event to Pardeeville.

The festival continues, since 1968, in Chandler Park in Pardeeville, WI, held the Saturday after Labor Day, hosted by the U. S. Watermelon Speed-Eating and Seed Spitting Championships Inc.


The Pardeeville Watermelon Festival is an annual fall festival held the first Saturday after Labor Day in September, hosted in beautiful Chandler Park. It is held in Pardeeville, WI, USA, home of the U.S. Watermelon Speed-Eating and Seed-Spitting Championships, Inc (USWSESSC). For more information, please use the links above. This website will be changing more and more as we get closer to our event, so check back soon. For more immediate information, please contact us.