A location in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
A location in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
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There's a set in position Florida that developed a twelve-foot-high monument during town to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would any individual should do that?
Well, very first off, heroes are really hard to investigation With this commit Florida - the Panhandle city of Wausau, household of under five hundred individuals for the duration of Washington County about ten miles south of Chipley.
Why not the possum, an not likely hero to state the least? No one else puts the possum over a pedestal. Why don't you Wausau?
Secondly, in 1982, Wausau got Bored with being left out with the Florida lists of enjoyment, fairs and festivals. Each and every put in place Florida demands a festival. And never 1 area in Florida features a Possum Pageant. Why don't you Wausau?
If you haven't attended Washington County, you most likely will think I'm generating this up. When you've got frequented Washington County, you'll fully grasp - and know This is actually the correct Tale.
Wausau, it turned out, had some fairly powerful possum politicians in the early '80s. Listed here are two issues they completed:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the Original Saturday in August as Possum Day in Florida. That led on the creating of your monument alongside State Highway seventy seven in Wausau.
They even got The usa Congress to marketplace the possum. Congress joined the fun by supplying the funds for Wausau's Possum Palace so Wausau might need a spot to help its annual Pleasurable Working day and Possum Pageant. That includes a queen contest and possum auction, between other matters, the Competition draws in thousands of individuals each year, plus they adore it.
Day out for a few educating of Northerners below. The South's possum will be the identical lowly animal you phone opossum, (Why use seven letters when 6 will perform?) It is a smallish marsupial that lives here in trees and shows its unsightly entire body only at nighttime. That is why, any time you end up Within the right place in position Florida, it is possible to listen to possum hunters' canine baying and barking. Treed by dogs, the possum 'freezes', so Will probably be effortless seize (or shoot) just one.
An inscription round the monument in the course of Wausau cites the possum's role in supplying 'each fur and foods' all over the generations. It goes to say: 'Their existence here has presented a resource of nutritious and flavorful meals in standard occasions and possesses been a significant aid to human survival for the duration of periods of distress and critical require.'
Chuckle if you want. The people of Wausau will snicker alongside - when downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.