So, when searching for some place special to go for Thaddeus's 14th birthday (when he turned 13; our first birthdays are the day we are born, so we turn 1 on our 2nd... I'll save this for another post), with winter being such a poor time to hit most destinations (said day being the 23rd of January, when many tourist attractions are closed), the idea hit to celebrate a week or so late in Punxsutawney.
Random groundhog fact: Punxsutawney Phil (Punxsy to the locals for both the rodent and the town) has been around for well over a century, deriving his immortality from a special concoction given in late summer.
Of course big pharma keeps this, along with the cure for cancer, from ever being used on humans.
After an adventurous trip up (again, saved for another post), we managed to arrive in Clearfield, PA on Sunday, 31 January, 2015. We had done enough research to know that this was a full weekend event, with the night before going non-stop and buses starting the run to Gobbler's Knob at 3AM (you can't actually park up there, instead either taking a bus from one of several locations around town or hiking 1.5 miles uphill). Not wanting to spend a bunch of time, effort and money just to arrive late and miss it or end up in the back and knowing some serious winter weather was on the way, we decided to scope the place out the day before.
Punxsutawney is a town of about 6000 residents, nearly the same as 100 years ago, but well down from the peak of over 10000 in the mid-20th century. Their High School moniker is "The Chucks" (a groundhog is also known as a woodchuck; Staten Island's February 2nd mascot is known as Staten Island Chuck, or Charles G Hogg; Chuck bit Mayor Bloomberg and was replaced by a Staten Island Charlotte, Chuck's granddaughter; Mayor de Blasio dropped Charlotte in 2014 and she died several days later). The town's population swells every February several times over; while attendance in the 1970's was just a few dozen, it climbed into the early 90's and broke 30000 after the movie in 1993; the record in 1997 was 35-37000, if we are to trust people who exploit rodents for economic gain.
If you put the emphasis on the first syllable, you are referring to a weather predicting rodent; the second, sausage.
Ask residents whether it is Groundhogs Day or Groundhog Day and they will answer with the latter. There are many towns claiming woodchuck meteorologists, but only one is the real deal.
While the local dentist gladly placed a Phil likeness outside his office (there are many around town painted in various ways, much like the mermaids of Norfolk, VA, but this one appeared to be a bootleg version carved to a different shape), the little fellow was turned down as spokesman for the orthodontist, for reasons not given.
The town is tucked back in the wooded mountains of Pennsylvania; the U.S. Highway that runs through (119) alternates between two and four lanes and cuts through neighborhoods and downtown areas; the other routes are smaller and get less attention in bad weather; I-80 is the nearest interstate, some 30 miles or so north. Most visitors stay in the neighboring towns of Dubois, Indiana or (like us) further out. Loyalties tend toward the Pittsburgh teams and there was little love for Brady and company shown. I was told that Phil pulled for the Seahawks in the Super Bowl.
The town openly revered their most well known citizen, not just with statuary, but gift shops, restaurants and even the groundhog club headquarters, which organizes the events every year. Of course, the million dollars he helps bring in to the local economy every year gives them every reason to put the furry guy front and center for the tourists. Like good tourists, we ate it up.
The movie may have been set in Punxsy, but it was filmed in Woodstock, Illinois. While both towns capitalized off of its success, I think the PA town got the better end of the deal.
Unlike in the movie, Gobbler's Knob is not the town square, it is a field just uphill from the town. Barclay Square, one of the spots to catch the bus to the Knob and the place where the vendors set up is also home to the mayor and the library; Phil's home is in the library with his wife, Phyllis.
The legend, which goes back to sayings regarding the weather on Candlemas Day, says that if the groundhog (or hedgehog in Germany) sees his shadow on this day, there will be six more weeks of winter (even though the calendar shows something like 7), but if not, there will be an early spring. Analyses of his predictions show the record to be somewhere around 40%, but fans say he is perfect - I say it depends on how you frame the question and interpret the answer. In any event, when he checks his shadow the next day, it will be 6 weeks until St. Patrick's Day, so have a pint in his honor when it comes.
Little known is the fact that groundhogs don't give a bucked tooth about their shadow, but are actually coming out to scope out mating prospects following hibernation (in the wild, they tend to not get along very well and hibernate separately). Leave it to the humans to not know the difference between a booty call and a weather forecast.
Phil does not hibernate, as his home is climate controlled outside of that one cold morning a year that he gets dragged away from civilization to once more show Jim Cantore how it's done.
We decided to do most of our souvenir shopping during our scouting expedition. The chamber of commerce seemed the most proper place to shop to directly support the town, but the independent vendors were a little cheaper and needed the business themselves. We ended up doing both, buying shirts at one and hat and scarf at another. A temporary booth set up in one of the stores had some delicious pretzels and flavored mustard (Cindy Lou's; email her at clo3080@comcast.net if you like that kind of thing - I really enjoyed the Hot Pepper Dipping Mustard and she had some yummy Italian and Ranch Pretzels).
Thus attired, we were ready for the big day and headed out for some sightseeing in Johnstown (yet another post) before heading back.
I got a fair number of compliments on the hat. The scarf (barely seen in the pic) got even more.
You can keep your Fifth Avenue; I'll take Mahoning Street.
By the time we left Johnstown, the winter storm warning was in effect and conditions got ugly. What should have been an hour drive was more than double that getting back to the hotel.
The next morning (which started around 1230) was even worse. Interstate 80 had whiteout conditions so bad that at 35 miles per hour, I could not tell which lane I was in. As I hit the back roads, the temperatures climbed a little and the blinding white snow switched to freezing rain, trading visibility for slippery roads. Once again, a drive of less than an hour took more than two, but it also kept traffic and crowds down.
The website for the town says "Snowfall can range from almost none to quite a lot". Not only did they fall into the latter category for 2014-15's winter, regardless of what the groundhog said, they already had an extra six weeks' worth of winter weather by February 2nd.
None of the cast of the movie were spotted, though the screenwriter, Danny Rubin, has been known to frequent the festivities and Steven Tobolowsky (who played Ned Ryerson in the movie and Sandy Ryerson on Glee) once hosted the event. While I did not expect Bill Murray or Andie MacDowell there (or even Chris Elliot, though that would have been a treat), I think I was most disappointed that Brian Doyle Murray was not the one to pull Phil out for the forecast; sure, the Top Hat guys deserve it for their dedication, but while the other actors seemed like actors to me, BDM seemed legit.
At least one of the other sites had early arrivals, but our party made up 3/4 of the passengers on the first bus out from Barclay Square. As traffic to the Knob becomes a one way loop in the wee hours of that special morning and the Square was the first stop coming down the mountain, we had the longest ride up, going around the town and past the local shopping centers and the newer Wal-Mart on the edge of town. And while the police and emergency personnel outnumbered civilians in the town, when we got to the Knob, the numbers were about even.
Groundhog Day is a holiday in Punxsy. Students and teachers get the day off. Bus drivers, on the other hand, have to be to work earlier than usual. Hopefully they are rewarded for their work - at $5 a pop for the ride up, there is plenty left over after paying for gas.
It was quite impressive seeing them handle the yellow monsters up and down the hills and around the tight curves, then down the narrow streets. The upside was that traction didn't seem to be a problem, but I seriously doubt guardrails would do much if the traction failed.
The Knob is not much in and of itself, but there is a sign, an arch and a few buildings. One blue tent was set up and heated to deal with potential frost bite and hypothermia, there was an information booth (really more of a souvenir stand where you could ask questions) with a large bonfire going behind it, a small snack bar that had a monopoly on hot chocolate, lots of news trucks, port-o-johns and a stage set at the bottom of a hill that made something of a natural amphitheater.
We scouted out the place, hit the head, bought a souvenir towel and found a good spot ahead of the later arrivals. There we camped for four hours to see a five minute ceremony (in the video, around the 4 minute mark, I can be seen waving my blue flag; look for the camera man on the platform left of center near the bottom in the green coat and I am just down and to his left; feel free to come back to the link if you want to do the whole thing in order and not see the finale first).
Many people get very angry when the groundhog sees his shadow. I would think that in the 21st century they would realize he is just a rodent and doesn't control the weather... he just has the power to predict it.
Despite the size of the event, a town the size of Punxsy can not afford full time dancers, entertainers, security, technicians and all the rest. Many of those who set up and run the show are volunteers, including emcees Dan McGinley (realtor by day) and Dave "Thunder Conductor" (the Top Hat guys have weather names, as did the dancers) Gigliotti (chriopractor) and Phil's Dancers. It was not clear if Slim Forsythe and the Beagle Brothers were paid for their musical performances, but there were a couple more musicians competing in the Gobblers Knob Got Talent competition and Miss Ohio doing a ventriloquist act.
Security was part State Police, part National Guard and part Indiana University, Punxsutawney Campus ROTC.
The audience was broken up into three sections. The front appeared to be VIPs and media. Behind that were the family and student sections (I think). The early crowd being thin and conditions being rough, we were rewarded with the opportunity to join a train around the audience and up on the stage. Thaddeus and I are waving our blue towels in this shot.
The invention of fire once meant the difference between life and death in ancient cultures. Today it means minimal comfort to those fools who venture out in the midst of a blizzard for the most ridiculous reasons. It is pretty, though, and for those holding a front row spot, a taunting voice calling, "warmth or good view?" "back of the crowd or death from hypothermia?"
I know; I heard it.
Ironically, the word umbrella comes from Greek and Latin root words for shadow and a French suffix for little. Were these an omen?
For an amateur show in the wee hours of the morning in the midst of some rough weather (when one has to assume there has been much partying), these guys did a pretty good job. They got one side chanting that it was "way too early" (as it was for those of us who got a couple hours sleep between the Super Bowl and the drive in) and the other "way too late" (again, a reference to those pulling all-nighters). The music alternated between DJ and live performances, there were towels thrown to the audience (and shot out of cannons), beach balls tossed around (and popped) and lots of silliness.
The emcees said this was not the biggest crowd ever (the best estimate I found was 11000, though judging by the number of buses I saw go before us and the fraction of the crowd gone on those buses, my own estimate was a fraction of that), but that we were the bravest. Given that the crowd was so much smaller than normal and really did roll in at the last minute, this might have been so. Brave or foolish.
None of Phil's Dancers (from PAHS) were born when the movie came out. Most of their parents were in elementary school when the Beastie Boys were at their peak.
I paid $5 for my towel. The ones being thrown/shot out at us were tubes of two, with the 6 more weeks tending to go more to our side; the guy behind us got one tube and handed the second towel to Thaddeus, so we both had a blue to wave (not his preference, but mine).
Regardless of color scheme or geographic location, this was my message. But the abundance of Steelers fans and color of the other towels (I think one of the girls on stage actually had a Steelers towel and not one of the the GHD's) just sealed the deal for me.
I like the cold and knew from jobs working out in bad weather how to dress, or so I thought. I was plenty warm enough at first, but as the temps held just above freezing from about 2AM until midday, the precipitation came down wet instead of frozen - something I had not prepared for. Some time around 4AM, the rain soaked through to my arms; by 530 or so, it had soaked through all over and the cold radiating from the ice had me alternating feet on the rail beside me (you might be surprised how much warmer a foot that is walking or otherwise kept off the ground can be compared to one, even in a decent outdoor shoe, that is constantly on the ice).
There were some real characters out, mostly repeat offenders. This one, who had been married on Groundhog Day (this is a popular time and place for that, though you have to book in advance), but said his wife outgrew the event, had been coming for 15 years. He said this was the worst weather he had seen, despite being there when the temp was -5F.
With all the artificial lighting around, it seemed impossible that the groundhog wouldn't see his shadow. The original sayings were directly related to the sun or clouds being out, which meant that this morning, he should not have.
There is nothing darker than the inside of a port-o-john in the woods at night. Old Phil might have cut the winter haters a break had the Top Hats done the ceremony in one of these.
Along with the "way too early/late" routine, we had to call forth Phil to wake him:
"You had to be there" was never more true.
After the talent show and all the miscellaneous entertainment, it was time for the national anthem with the accompanying fireworks show. I took a video and even did a time lapse that was pretty cool, but as I have been at this for some time and have easily made this the longest blog entry yet (I am seriously thinking my first non-fiction work might be on the subject, but I have a couple more novels to get out before then), I will turn up my filter.
It must be said that this was not only the best GHD fireworks I had seen, but also the best pre-dawn fireworks for any occasion.
Groundhogs must be sung awake because being woken by the explosions of nearby fireworks might result in 6 weeks of fire and brimstone? (Or possibly the 60 weeks of winter promised if he didn't get a drink during prohibition?)
Where I come from, fireworks are safely launched at some distance over water. These were crazy close, very loud and looked very cool behind the trees, especially the ones that went off at ground level.
As stated, the big three rewatchable movies are still great when you know the lines, or maybe more so. And you know the lines because they are so quotable and you rehearse them because they fit so well elsewhere. At this point, the "Is your house on fire, Clark?" and singing of the national anthem by Grace could cross from Christmas to Groundhog Day easily, but so could the lines "Audrey is frozen from the waist down" and "all part of the experience".
If you were saving the link to the ceremony, now's the time...
I'm not sure how it is in normal years, but the Knob cleared out quickly this year. And once we got back (we had the shortest ride down, though the warmth of the bus made it so we would have been happy to detour through Erie, Philly and Scranton), the vendors looked to be debating whether they should just pack it in and call it quits. Where the buses were supposed to keep running the loop until 2PM, I heard that there was no one to pick up by 10AM.
If you've never been to Ocean City in February, you should go. You own the place; it's like the Outer Banks of North Carolina used to be in winter, only more so. I have always been fascinated by the off-season and long wanted to live in a tourist place year round, where I can enjoy the excitement and activity of the busy times with lots of new and different people, but also the community during the rest of the year (and maybe the sense of being a year rounder in the midst of the interlopers). But I don't think there is anywhere that has more of an off-season than Gobbler's Knob. I know it is open and used at other times, but one day with 5 digit attendance in such a remote place...
If you're a fan of the movie, you know what comes next (since the wife and Avis frown upon driving on the railroad tracks and kidnapping Phil is not as easy as it appeared).
Too early for flapjacks?
