nPostednon December 11, 2015
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n Innthe town of Enterprise, Alabama, city officials dedicated anmonument…to an agricultural pest!
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nThenmonument was dedicated to an insect called the boll weevil, ancreature that had been devastating farmers’ crops left, right, andncenter.
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nWh-wh-wh-whynhonor a pest? you ask?
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nWell,nI think that the monument was really honoring people’s ability tonmeet a challenge with change, and then come back better than before.nHere’s the story:
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nInnthe late 1800s and early 1900s, a beetle that had been common innMexico began to appear in southern states in the U.S., creating havocnby infesting cotton crops. In 1915 the first boll weevils appeared innAlabama, and by 1918, farmers were losing entire cotton crops to thencritter.
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nAnman named H. M. Sessions decided that this wasn’t JUST a disaster; itnwas also an opportunity. He convinced a farmer to grow peanuts, andnthey met with such quick success that many other farmers switched tongrowing peanuts, as well.
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nEventuallyncotton was grown in the region again, and some farmers whondiversified did so with crops other than cotton and peanuts. Thenpeople of Enterprise and Coffee County, Alabama, ended up with a morenstable economy because of the variety of crops grown in the area.
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nSonREALLY the monument is a tribute to people who changed disaster intongrowth and a reminder to always face adversity with creativity. n
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nSo…tellnme about this statue…
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Asnyou can see, the statue depicts a woman in a lovely, flowing gown.nShe is holding over her head a trophy. On top of the trophy is a bollnweevil, but that was added 30 years after the original statue wasnunveiled – apparently, the original designers were perfectly happynto create a boll weevil monument with no boll weevil!
Asnyou can see, the statue depicts a woman in a lovely, flowing gown.nShe is holding over her head a trophy. On top of the trophy is a bollnweevil, but that was added 30 years after the original statue wasnunveiled – apparently, the original designers were perfectly happynto create a boll weevil monument with no boll weevil!n
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nItnis strange to realize that the boll weevil has been stolen manyntimes. Apparently the entire monument has been stolen, even! Eachntime city officials have found the monument or beetle and restorednthe statue, until 1998, when the statue was so badly damaged bynvandals that it would be too costly to repair. Now the originalnstatue (which was sculpted in Italy for about $1,800) stands in anmuseum with security cameras, and the statue that appears at thenoriginal site, at the center of a fountain in downtown Enterprise, isna polymer-resin replica. (Polymer-resin is a sort of plastic.)
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nAlsonon this date:
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nUNICEF’snbirthday
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nInternationalnMountain Day
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nPhysicistnMax Born’s birthday
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nProclamationnof the Republic Day in Burkina Faso
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nAnniversarynof the first recorded sighting of the Aurora Borealis in America
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nPlannahead:
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Checknout my Pinterest pages on:
Checknout my Pinterest pages on:
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nHistoricaln anniversaries in December
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nAndnhere are my Pinterest boards for:
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nJanuaryn birthdays
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