Create a catapult for inaugural Cantigny contest
The parade grounds at Cantigny Park in Wheaton will be dotted with tennis balls fired from handmade catapults Saturday as the First Division Museum hosts its first Catapult Contest.
About 25 teams from across the suburbs will launch catapults they built themselves to see whose can hurl a tennis ball the farthest beginning at 11 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 22, said Melissa Tyer, museum educator at the First Division Museum.
Each team gets three chances to come up with the farthest fling. It's the airborne distance that counts, Tyer said.
“Where it first bounces, not where it rolls to,” Tyer said.
Competitors will be grouped into two age divisions, one mainly for kids in middle school or younger and one for those in high school or older, Tyer said.
Luke Vazzano, 12, of Glen Ellyn and three friends from the science club at Glen Crest Middle School in Glen Ellyn will compete with a black catapult they built with $20 in 2-by-4s, bunjee cords and screws, said Steve Vazzano, Luke's father.
Vazzano said he and other parents supervised the project as Luke, Jack Hecker, David Borneman and Ajay Kirtikar, all of Glen Ellyn, built a Popsicle-stick prototype, then the real thing.
“They're able to see what works, what doesn't, test it, make it better,” Vazzano said.
A science teacher told the boys about the contest, which Vazzano said has been interesting so far because building a catapult is unusual.
“It is a bit out of the ordinary,” Vazzano said. “It's been a lot of fun for the boys.”
Hosting the contest allows the First Division Museum to bring to life a type of war machine used by armies as old as the ancient Greeks and Romans and medieval forces.
Tyer said she expects many catapults in the contest to function using counterweights, swings, slingshots and gravity.
“We're excited to see what everyone came up with,” Tyer said.
At least two catapults on the parade grounds Saturday will be constructed with Legos.
But the Lego flinging machines Jeff Viens of Lombard brings to Cantigny won't be competing in the contest, he said.
Viens holds a record in the Book of Alternative World Records for longest distance thrown by a Lego war machine. So instead of outdoing his amateur competition, he'll display his catapults, demonstrating the physics that allows his smaller, 22-inch tall catapult to throw further than his 6-foot, 2-inch giant catapult.
“The bigger something in Lego gets, the more flexible it is, so you lose a lot of energy,” Viens said. “So my smaller one actually throws farther than the big one.”
Spectators are welcome to watch the tennis ball-flinging action on Saturday. Admission is free with $5 parking, Tyer said.
If you go
If you go
What: Catapult Contest
When: 11 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 22
Where: Cantigny Park parade grounds, 1S151 Winfield Road, Wheaton
Cost: Admission free with $5 parking
Info: (630) 668-5161 or cantigny.org