Pepper Team Lacivita going for the gold

For the first time in my 84-year lifespan, I have been unable to plant a garden. Growing up in the Great Depression, I recall helping my immigrant father Giovanni plant 100 pepper and 300 tomato plants, so we wouldn’t starve.

This spring while recovering from open heart surgery, I enlisted the aid of two of my grandsons, 18-year-old Patrick Kreiger and 21-year-old Jeffrey Vicarel. They didn’t know the difference between a pepper and a tomato plant. They used a pitchfork for the first time. Today’s children are so focused on book learning that they are missing out on down-to-earth lessons, like our Amish country neighbors’ children. They planted about 40 pepper and 20 tomato plants.

Premium peppers

For the past 15 consecutive years, I have raised six foot-plus, sweet frying, roasting and stuffing peppers. For the past four years my pepper plants have won a first premium at the Canfield Fair in the oddities division. Canfield Fair’s director in charge of farm products, Craig Myers, considers this quite an accomplishment. I rate this honor at the top of my list, with being an inductee into the “Ohio Senior Citizens Hall of Fame” and “Ohio Veterans Hall of Fame”.

Another compliment I received about my six footers was from veteran farmer and long time fair exhibitor, Earl Slagle from Salem, Ohio, who said he had never seen such pepper plants. For 30 years he raised 250,000 pepper plants per year, which translates into 7,500,000 over that time period.

How do I do it? God only knows. Maybe it’s my big black and yellow bumblebee friend, the pollinator. Pepper Team Lacivita, comprised of Grandpa Michael and Grandsons Patrick and Jeffrey, will try for the gold again at the fair next year, God willing. We are shooting to make the Guinness Book of World Records.

X Michael J. Lacivita is a Youngstown retiree.