"A Possum In Every Pot" E.W. Carswell

Foreword
The idea for this collection of information about America's Magnificent Marsupial, the Opossum (hereinafter called Possum), was spawned to meet needs created by several possum festivals or auctions that have sprung up in the Southeastern United States. One of these was in Wausau, Florida, and another was in Arcadia, Louisiana. The Wausau festival began as Funday. It was a day (first Saturday in August each year) in which people came from far and near to join local residents in their fun-making activities. The day long program has been described as one of the region's -- maybe even the nation's -- most authentic folk festivals. It remains one of the most unrehearsed and spontaneous.

In the "unrehearsed and spontaneous" departments, the Louisiana festival is providing the Florida folks with some lively competition. Its promoters claim, among other things, that it is their state's "most disorganized festival" Arcadia, like Wausau, has gained a measure of international fame from its annual possum festivities. It is sponsored and staged on the last Saturday in June each year by Possums Unlimited, Inc., a non-profit organization headquartered in Arcadia.

It is in the spirit of Holiday or Funday that the respective festival programs were arranged. Possum hunters among the clay hills of North Louisiana and the sand hills of West Florida, for example, collect the marsupials for weeks in advance of the summer festivals. A few possums are often brought from afar. Few people seemed at first to think that the auctions would be more than a one-time attraction at each festival The auctions added a new dimension to each program, however, and they have at times threatened to overshadow the other events. With proceeds from the auctions being pledged to civic and related projects, the bidding each yearhas been spirited; and the possum auction has become an integral part of the festival tradition in the two communities, more than 500 highway miles apart

Possum sales at the Funday auction in 1974 totaled more than $2,300, witha prize specimen bringing more than $250. Sales totals have been greater eachyear in the meantime, with the prize possum in 1978 bringing $l,000. That specimen was Sand Hill Sam,III, acclaimed as the prize stud possum at that year's Funday Pageant and Possum Festival Proceeds from Louisiana Festival go to charitable causes, just as they do from the It is in the spirit of fun that I have undertaken the preparation, revision and expansion of this book It is hopefully to help the reader share some of the spirit and background of each occasion that I have included numerous newspaper articles, along with Rodney Cook's and my own personal columns. The articles and columns were written mostly in halfjest, of course, but without obscuring the truth from those even vaguely familiar with the settings and the subjects.
Each setting reflects the hospitable warmth of the Deep South, an Eden-like land of imagination, rich in history, romance and inspiration