A Place in Florida - Let us Cheer the Lowly Possum
A Place in Florida - Let us Cheer the Lowly Possum
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There is a commit Florida that built a twelve-foot-substantial monument throughout town to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would any one might like to do that?
Effectively, to start, heroes are complicated to seek out During this put set up Florida - the Panhandle city of Wausau, dwelling of under five hundred persons in the middle of Washington County about ten miles south of Chipley.
Why don't you the possum, an not likely hero to mention the least? No person else places the possum by using a pedestal. Why not Wausau?
Secondly, back 1982, Wausau obtained fed up with currently being disregarded in the Florida lists of enjoyable, fairs and festivals. Each commit Florida requirements a Pageant. And not a person place in position Florida features a Possum Pageant. Why not Wausau?
If you have never absent to Washington County, you most likely will Imagine I am making this up. In case you have attended Washington County, you will comprehend - and know This may be a legitimate Tale.
Wausau, it proved, experienced some fairly powerful possum politicians in early '80s. Here i will discuss a pair of issues they accomplished:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the very very first Saturday in August as Possum Day in Florida. That led on the making while in the monument alongside Point out Highway seventy seven in Wausau.
They even bought The us Congress to market the possum. Congress joined the enjoyment via offering the money for Wausau's Possum Palace so Wausau could have a location to support its yearly Exciting Day and Possum Competition. That includes a queen contest and possum auction, amid other things, the festival draws in A huge number of people on a yearly basis, and they also like it.
Trip for your handful of educating of Northerners listed here. The South's possum is the identical lowly animal you simply call opossum, (Why use click here seven letters when six will do?) It is a smallish marsupial that life in trees and reveals its unpleasant overall body only at night. That is why, when you are In the ideal put in place Florida, you are able to hear possum hunters' dogs baying and barking. Treed by dogs, the possum 'freezes', so It is not challenging to trap (or shoot) one particular.
An inscription regarding the monument all through Wausau cites the possum's role in giving 'the two fur and food' in the complete generations. It goes on say: 'Their presence listed here has provided an origin of nutritious and flavorful food stuff in typical periods and it has been a significant guide to human survival in occasions of distress and critical want.'
Giggle if you prefer. The persons of Wausau will chortle along with you - while downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.