There's a devote Florida that built a twelve-foot-large monument in the center of town to exalt the lowly possum. Now, why would everyone wish to do that?
Effectively, to start out, heroes choose time and effort to find in just this set in position Florida - the Panhandle city of Wausau, home of fewer than five hundred folks in the middle of Washington County about 10 miles south of Chipley.
Why not the possum, an unlikely hero to put it mildly? No one else places the possum over a pedestal. Why don't you Wausau?
Secondly, back in 1982, Wausau bought sick and tired of getting disregarded through the Florida lists of entertaining, fairs and festivals. Just about every spend Florida needs a Competition. And never just one devote Florida includes a Possum Competition. Why don't you Wausau?
If you have by no means gone to Washington County, you most likely will Assume I'm thus, making this up. Should you have visited Washington County, you are going to fully grasp - and know This is actually the correct Tale.
Wausau, it wound up, experienced some really potent possum politicians while in the early '80s. Listed below are two factors they completed:
They persuaded the Florida Legislature to proclaim the quite to start with Saturday in August as Possum Day in Florida. That led for the constructing in the monument along State Freeway seventy seven in Wausau.
They even received The usa Congress to advertise the possum. Congress joined the pleasurable by supplying the resources for Wausau's Possum Palace so Wausau could possibly have a spot to carry its yearly Exciting Day and Possum Festival. Showcasing a queen contest and possum auction, between other factors, the Competition appeals to Many folks per year, and so that they adore it.
Time out for lots of educating of Northerners right here. The South's possum is the identical lowly animal you connect with opossum, (Why use 7 letters when 6 will do?) It is a smallish marsupial that lives in trees and shows its hideous system only during the night time. This is why, after you end up Within the correct place in place Florida, it is possible to hear possum hunters' pet dogs baying and barking. Treed by canine, the possum 'freezes', so it can be easy to entice (or shoot) one particular.
An inscription about the monument in the course of Wausau cites the possum's job in supplying 'the two fur and meals' through the entire centuries. It goes more info to say: 'Their existence below has delivered a resource of nutritious and flavorful foods in ordinary situations and has been an important assist to human survival for the duration of occasions of distress and critical will need.'
Laugh If you need. The people of Wausau will snicker with you - although downing baked possum and sweet potatoes.