Madison Wisconsin’s New City Bird

Plastic pink flamingo voted Madison’s city bird
by Broderick Perkins
examiner.com of Tampa Bay
September 3, 2009

Wisconsin’s capital city alders, inspired by what’s become a historic college prank, have named the pink flamingo the city’s official bird.

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Not the real feathered variety indigenous to the wilds of Africa, South America, the Caribbean and the Galapagos Islands.

The plastic pink version found on lawns — good, bad and ugly — throughout America.

Madison City Council voted 15-4 this week to give a lawn decoration perhaps the first such distinction, much to the chagrin of some residents and dissenting alders.

The questionable honor was bestowed upon the kitschy ornament because of a 1979 prank by leaders of the University of Wisconsin student government’s Pail and Shovel Party. Continue reading “Madison Wisconsin’s New City Bird”