A Place in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
A Place in Florida - Let's Cheer the Lowly Possum
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There is a devote Florida that crafted a 12-foot-significant monument in the course of city to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would anybody choose to do that?
Well, to start out, heroes just take time and effort to come back by within this invest Florida - the Panhandle city of Wausau, house of below five hundred individuals in the center of Washington County about ten miles south of Chipley.
Why not the possum, an not likely hero understandably? No one else places the possum using a pedestal. Why not Wausau?
Secondly, last 1982, Wausau obtained Ill and fatigued with currently being ignored from the Florida lists of pleasurable, fairs and festivals. Each individual commit Florida wants a Competition. And not a single dedicate Florida includes a Possum Festival. Why not Wausau?
If you have not absent to Washington County, you probably will Assume I'm producing this up. In case you have gone to Washington County, you'll recognize - and know This is a accurate Tale.
Wausau, it turned out, had some pretty effective possum politicians throughout the early '80s. Allow me to share two or three things they achieved:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the initial Saturday in August as Possum Day in Florida. That led to the making during the monument along Point out Freeway 77 in Wausau.
They even got The usa Congress to publicize the possum. Congress joined the enjoyment by supplying the cash for Wausau's Possum Palace so Wausau would've a spot to help keep its annual Enjoyable Working day and Possum Festival. That includes a queen contest and possum auction, get more info between other matters, the Competition attracts Many individuals Each individual and each and every year, as well as they like it.
Trip for your couple educating of Northerners right here. The South's possum is the same lowly animal you call opossum, (Why use 7 letters when six will almost certainly do?) It is a smallish marsupial that life in trees and demonstrates its unattractive overall body only in the evening. That is why, if you are Within the appropriate make investments Florida, you'll be able to hear possum hunters' puppies baying and barking. Treed by canine, the possum 'freezes', so it really is not so tough to hook (or shoot) one particular.
An inscription concerning the monument in the middle of Wausau cites the possum's part in supplying 'both of those fur and foodstuff' through the entire centuries. It goes onto say: 'Their presence in this article has provided an origin of nutritious and flavorful foods in usual occasions and it's got been an important aid to human survival in occasions of distress and significant want.'
Chuckle when you'd choose. The men and women of Wausau will chuckle with you - while downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.