The watermelon is a big red signal of summer. And as the photo at the top of the story suggests, there is something inherently fun about this juicy and oversized fruit. In that photo from the old game show Play Your Hunch, the couple had to guess the weight of the watermelon, and you would be hard pressed to name anything else in the grocery aisle that would make the challenge as zany as that hefty—we’ll guess 19 pounds—piece of produce.
The wonderful watermelon popped up many times over the years in the pages of LIFE, and in all kinds of settings. It was once even the centerpiece of a boozy beach blowout.
A 1948 story in LIFE carried the oh-so-tantalizing title Fun on the Beach: Summer Finds Americans Shedding Clothing and Inhibitions at Seaside. The watermelon was the star of the party, as revelers turned it into a vehicle for alcohol. One caption spoke enviously of the young people “stretching out and sipping spiked watermelon punch.” The photos here give rich documentation of the party people arriving at the San Diego beach with watermelons in tow, infusing the watermelons with alcohol, and then drinking from the watermelons as day turned to night.
LIFE has on more than one occasion gone to the farms to show where these mighty melons are harvested. LIFE staff photographers Wallace Kirkland, chronicler of so many scenes of American agriculture, took photos of a watermelon harvest in Illinois in the 1940s, and the legendary Loomis Dean documented workers in the fields of Imperial Valley in Califlornia, showing in one beautiful picture how the laborers formed a human conveyer belt to help get the melons into the back of a truck.
In 1960 LIFE applied a deliriously dramatic headline, “Major Melon Massace in Metuchen” to the story of a watermelon eating contest in New Jersey. A local real estate agency had sponsored the contest in an example of old-school brand building. The photos, in addition to showing cute kids chomping away, show how watermelons have evolved between then and now, because all those melons had the black mature seeds that have all but been eliminated from the product on sale in today’s grocery stores. (Seedless watermelons, a testimony to the power fo plant breeding, began to take over the market in the 1990s, ). At the New Jersey contest those black seeds inspired gamesmanship among contests who picked them out before the contest’s official start. The story closed with a quote from one boy who hadn’t. He complained, “I swallowed so many seeds I’m going to grow a watermelon patch in my stomach.”
A spiked watermelon beach party in San Diego, 1948.
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
A spiked watermelon beach party in San Diego, 1948.
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
A spiked watermelon beach party in San Diego, 1948.
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
A spiked watermelon beach party in San Diego, 1948.
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
A spiked watermelon beach party in San Diego, 1948.
Allan Grant The LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Migrant workers harvesting watermelons in the Imperial Valley, California, 1947.
Loomis Dean/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Migrant workers harvesting watermelons in the Imperial Valley, California, 1947.
Loomis Dean/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Workers harvesting watermelons in the Imperial Valley, California, 1947.
Loomis Dean/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
An Illinois watermelon harvest, 1946.
Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
A little boy eating watermelon by the handful while sitting on a pile of melons, 1946.
Wallace Kirkland/Life Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon harvesting, 1943.
Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon harvest, 1943.
Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Scene from a watermelon harvest, 1943.
Wallace Kirkland/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon-eating contest, New Jersey, 1960
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
After the watermelon-eating contest, New Jersey, 1960.
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon eating contest in New Jersey, 1960.
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon contest, 1960.
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon contest, 1960.
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon contest, 1960.
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon-eating contest, New Jersey, 1960.
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
Watermelon-eating contest winners Barbara Walp, 10, and Willy Jones, 13, were crowned king and queen of the watermelon festival by Miss New Jersey, Susan Barber, 1960.
Joe Scherschel/LIFE Picture Collection/Shutterstock
