A location in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
A location in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
Blog Article
There is a devote Florida that built a 12-foot-high monument in the guts of city to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would any individual want to perform that?
Well, to begin with, heroes are tricky to investigation with this put in position Florida - the Panhandle city of Wausau, home of beneath five hundred people in the middle of Washington County about 10 miles south of Chipley.
Why not the possum, an not likely hero to say the minimum? No one else places the possum on a pedestal. Why not Wausau?
Secondly, again in 1982, Wausau obtained Sick and tired of remaining overlooked on the Florida lists of fun, fairs and festivals. Every single place in place Florida demands a Pageant. And never a single commit Florida includes a Possum Competition. Why not Wausau?
If you have never gone to Washington County, you most likely will Feel I am generating this up. When you have visited Washington County, you'll recognize - and know this is a accurate story.
Wausau, it ended up, experienced some pretty strong possum politicians in the early '80s. Here's some things they completed:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the Original Saturday in August as Possum Day in Florida. That led for the constructing on the monument along Condition Freeway seventy seven in Wausau.
They even acquired America Congress to industry the possum. Congress here joined the enjoyment by delivering the resources for Wausau's Possum Palace so Wausau might have an area to carry its yearly Pleasurable Day and Possum Festival. Featuring a queen contest and possum auction, among other items, the festival appeals to A huge number of persons each year, and Additionally they obtain it irresistible.
Outing for plenty of educating of Northerners in this article. The South's possum is the identical lowly animal you simply call opossum, (Why use 7 letters when six will do?) It's a smallish marsupial that lives in trees and displays its unappealing physique only at nighttime. This is exactly why, when you are inside the appropriate dedicate Florida, you may hear possum hunters' pet dogs baying and barking. Treed by canine, the possum 'freezes', for that reason it really is easy more than enough seize (or shoot) 1.
An inscription regarding the monument for the duration of Wausau cites the possum's function in delivering 'both of those fur and meals' in the whole hundreds of years. It goes onto say: 'Their existence in this article has delivered a resource of nutritious and flavorful foods in typical periods and it has been a crucial enable to human survival considerably more distress and demanding need.'
Chortle if you'd desire. The people today of Wausau will chuckle together with you - even though downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.