A spot in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
A spot in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
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There's a place in Florida that designed a twelve-foot-large monument for the duration of city to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would anybody have to do that?
Effectively, to start with, heroes are tough to have in this position in Florida - the Panhandle town of Wausau, property of below five hundred people throughout Washington County about ten miles south of Chipley.
Why don't you the possum, an unlikely hero to put it mildly? Nobody else puts the possum on the pedestal. Why don't you Wausau?
Next, in 1982, Wausau got Fed up with being disregarded in the Florida lists of entertaining, fairs and festivals. Each individual commit Florida needs a Pageant. Rather than a person dedicate Florida carries a Possum Pageant. Why don't you Wausau?
If you have not attended Washington County, you probably will think I am creating this up. Should you have been to Washington County, you are going to understand - and know this can be a true story.
Wausau, it proved, experienced some really impressive possum politicians while in the early '80s. Listed here are a pair of factors they completed:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the very first Saturday in August as Possum Working day in Florida. That led on the building from the monument alongside State Freeway 77 in Wausau.
They even acquired The us Congress to market the possum. Congress joined the pleasurable by the cash for Wausau's Possum Palace so Wausau might need a here place to hold its yearly Pleasurable Day and Possum Pageant. That includes a queen contest and possum auction, amid other factors, the festival draws in Many individuals Every and each year, plus they like it.
Time out to get a couple of educating of Northerners below. The South's possum is similar lowly animal you connect with opossum, (Why use seven letters when 6 can do?) It is a smallish marsupial that lives in trees and shows its unappealing entire body only at nighttime. That's why, When you are Within the proper commit Florida, it is possible to listen to possum hunters' pet dogs baying and barking. Treed by canines, the possum 'freezes', so it really is not so challenging to trap (or shoot) 1.
An inscription around the monument in the center of Wausau cites the possum's role in supplying 'each fur and meals' through the generations. It goes onto say: 'Their presence here has furnished a source of nutritious and flavorful food stuff in standard occasions and possesses been a big aid to human survival considerably more distress and important need.'
Chuckle for those who'd favor. The individuals of Wausau will laugh together with you - whilst downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.