A spot in Florida - Let us Cheer the Lowly Possum
A spot in Florida - Let us Cheer the Lowly Possum
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There's a place in place Florida that created a 12-foot-high monument during town to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would anybody need to do that?
Perfectly, to begin with, heroes are hard to find On this devote Florida - the Panhandle money of scotland- Wausau, household of fewer than five hundred people in the center of Washington County about 10 miles south of Chipley.
Why don't you the possum, an unlikely hero to put it mildly? No person else puts the possum on a pedestal. Why not Wausau?
Next, back 1982, Wausau acquired fed up with being left out with the Florida lists of fun, fairs and festivals. Each individual spend Florida needs a Pageant. And never a person commit Florida contains a Possum Pageant. Why not Wausau?
If you have never been to Washington County, you probably will think I am building this up. For those who have attended Washington County, you may recognize - and know This is actually the correct Tale.
Wausau, it proved, had some really strong possum politicians in early '80s. Here's two issues they completed:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the Preliminary Saturday in August as Possum Day in Florida. That led for the making from the monument alongside Condition Highway seventy seven in Wausau.
They even acquired The us Congress to advertise the possum. Congress joined the exciting as a result of furnishing the cash for Wausau's Possum Palace so Wausau could have a location to help keep its annual Pleasurable Day and Possum Pageant. Showcasing a queen contest and possum auction, amid other things, the Pageant appeals to Lots of individuals annually, and in order that they find it irresistible.
Time out for some educating of Northerners listed here. The South's possum is the same lowly animal you contact opossum, (Why use 7 letters when six will do?) It is a smallish marsupial that lives in trees and reveals its unattractive human body only at nighttime. That's why, when you find yourself Within the right devote Florida, you could listen to possum hunters' dogs baying and barking. Treed by canines, the possum 'freezes', so it is actually not so difficult seize (or shoot) just one.
An inscription around the monument in the middle of Wausau cites the possum's part in offering 'both fur and food stuff' throughout the hundreds of years. It goes on to say: 'Their presence below has offered an origin of nutritious and flavorful foodstuff in normal instances and consists of been An important support to human survival through times of distress and demanding will need.'
Chortle in the event you'd desire. The folks of Wausau will chuckle together with you - check here whilst downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.