A Place in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
A Place in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
Blog Article
There is a devote Florida that developed a 12-foot-superior monument in the course of town to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would anyone desire to do that?
Properly, to begin with, heroes are hard to search out on this put set up Florida - the Panhandle town of Wausau, home of fewer than 500 persons in the middle of Washington County about 10 miles south of Chipley.
Why don't you the possum, an unlikely hero as you would expect? Nobody else places the possum to the pedestal. Why don't you Wausau?
Secondly, back in 1982, Wausau bought fed up with currently being overlooked from the Florida lists of exciting, fairs and festivals. Every devote Florida wants a festival. Rather than just one place in position Florida contains a Possum Pageant. Why don't you Wausau?
If you haven't been to Washington County, you most likely will Consider I'm building this up. When you have attended Washington County, you will understand - and know It's a true story.
Wausau, it turned out, had some really effective possum politicians noisy . '80s. Here are a set of things they attained:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the first Saturday in August as Possum Working day in Florida. That led on the constructing during the monument alongside State Freeway 77 in Wausau.
They even bought The us Congress to advertise the possum. Congress joined the enjoyment by the money for Wausau's Possum Palace so website Wausau might have a region to maintain its annual Entertaining Day and Possum Festival. Featuring a queen contest and possum auction, amid other factors, the Pageant appeals to many people every year, plus they locate it irresistible.
Time out for many educating of Northerners here. The South's possum is similar lowly animal you connect with opossum, (Why use 7 letters when 6 will accomplish?) It's a smallish marsupial that lives in trees and exhibits its unattractive physique only in the evening. This is why, if you're throughout the appropriate commit Florida, you can listen to possum hunters' canine baying and barking. Treed by canines, the possum 'freezes', so it's simple to hook (or shoot) one.
An inscription over the monument in the middle of Wausau cites the possum's part in furnishing 'the two fur and food stuff' from the generations. It goes on to say: 'Their presence listed here has furnished a resource of nutritious and flavorful food in regular instances and it's got been a very important assist to human survival in times of distress and significant require.'
Snicker if you prefer. The people of Wausau will giggle along - even though downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.