1074 Queen for a Day

Forreston, IL celebrated its German roots with Sauerkraut Day in September for about 50 years. The last event was in 1960. But when my family lived there (when I was a little girl) the odor would permeate the whole town. 30,000 hungry people would come to our tiny town (about 1,000) and stand in line for two tons of free sauerkraut and a ton of hot dogs. As little ones we looked up to and admired the "Sauerkraut Queen" one of the glamorous high school girls. But I've often wondered if later in life, while living maybe in San Diego or Houston, a woman would admit to a past of being Sauerkraut Queen or maybe the Ogle County Pork Queen (another biggie in our farming county)?

This morning's paper reported that the Port Clinton Walleye Festival will not have a queen this year because it is under new management, and the committee didn't know how to run a queen pageant, so it was dropped. Some lucky young lady will not be able to tell her grandchildren, "I was first runner-up to Miss Walleye in 2005."