Location: Welch, Okla.
Owners: Tim and Beth Wright
History: Tim Wright grew up in California and fondly remembers trips to farms and pumpkin patches as a child. When the family moved to Oklahoma, however, the mazes he wanted to take his children to weren’t like those he visited when he was a child.
“They had a lot of games, rides and things like that,” Tim recalled. “When I came here, I couldn’t find one like that; it was just a field of pumpkins, so we started our own.”
Tim worked in commercial construction for several years, then moved to making furniture. Still, it wasn’t what he wanted to do, so the timing of creating his family’s agritourism destination was perfect, and the dream of Annabelle’s Fun Farm began in 2010.
“My dad (Lyle Wright) said to do something a child would want to see,” Tim recalled. “I asked him what he meant, and he said to make it like a storybook, like places they see in their coloring books, real cartoony.”
Of the 62 acres on the farm, about 30 are sourced for Annabelle’s Fun Farm.
Attractions: Annabelle’s Fun Farm is packed with rides, games, a barnyard playground, pumpkin bowling, mini golf, and many other activities. There is still a pumpkin patch and a maze.
The Wrights grow their pumpkins. If their crop is not successful, they bring pumpkins in from Nebraska. This season, the Wrights have moved the pumpkin patch across the road from the farm, allowing guests to access the pumpkin patch without paying admission to the farm. “We built a large market so they can come, buy a pumpkin, corn cobs and things like that,” Tim said, adding that a new you-pick blackberry patch and bakery is also in the works for the pumpkin patch.
The corn maze is actually a 4-acre sorghum maze. “After the first couple of years, we were in a pretty good drought, and because we have to plant so late in the summer for a fall corn maze, we went sorghum. It grows under drought conditions and does well for us. It also eliminates people picking the corn and throwing it at each other.”
Annabelle’s Fun Farm has been voted one of the top 20 pumpkin patches in the nation by USA Today.
A New Business: As they built Annabelle’s Fun Farm, Tim and Beth were contacted by other venues that wanted similar structures and features. Bookings for the next season sold out in less than two minutes.
“Now, I travel the country off doing attractions for other venues nationwide,” Tim said. “The great part is when I go to other farms, they learn from me, and I can learn little tricks and techniques from them or about a different crop. It’s always educational for me to go to these farms and work.”
