COPPER MOUNTAIN — The cry of “Remember the Tomatoes!” doesn’t have the historical heft of “Remember the Alamo!” but a cross-border food fight does have a history in Colorado. And it’s being revived, kind of.
The Tomato Battle on Saturday at Copper Mountain resort evokes memories of the annual Colorado-Texas Tomato War of the 1980s. The frenzied veggie brawl was launched in Twin Lakes, about 140 miles southwest of Denver, as a way to vent about Texans vacationing in Colorado.
The weapons were truckloads of rotten tomatoes, but the fight ended in the early 1990s amid concerns about insurance.
The new battle’s organizer says he wasn’t aware of the original faceoff. Clint Nelson likens the new, noncompetitive event to Spain’s La Tomatina festival, where participants throw overripe tomatoes.
