Jungle Jim’s Corn
Jungle Jim’s Soup
I think just about everything in Pigeon Forge is along Rt. 441. At the 3 Bears General Store I hit a trifecta. A Big Bear (Animals), a Big Santa (Seasonal) and here a Big Hot Dog (Food & Drink). Lots of places with multiple subjects generally stay within the same genre. The 3 Bears General Store also offers a wide range of offerings. Stop in and see what I mean.
Pigeon Forge Hot Dog
Maybe by the time you get to Pigeon Forge this ice cream stand will be finished, it was pretty well along the way to completion. Next door to Fantasy Golf, it will be a good place to stop and enjoy a soft serve cone, maybe dipped in chocolate with some jimmies on top.
Pigeon Forge Cone
On our way to Gatlinburg, Tennessee for a little R&R, we passed through Pigeon Forge, it was a busy Monday afternoon and traffic was moving slowly. Eagle-eyed Deb spotted this first of many Big Things present in town. We made a quick U-turn and grabbed this Big Coke out in front of the Country Bottle Shop selling Coca Cola Collectibles. The bottle says “Return for Deposit,” I wonder what the deposit is for a bottle this size?
Tennessee Coke
In 2011 we visited Philadelphia for Christmas. While there we visited the new location of Keystone Homebrewing, which is Andy’s store of choice. I had been to the old location a couple of times, it was located in an old house and it was jammed with products for the homebrew crowd. This new location has all kinds of room with more products available. I didn’t expect to find these large items. This threesome of images taken at Keystone Brewing during our visit were lost for a while, I’m glad I found them. I did think about buying the glass, what an excuse, “Officer, I only had one glass of wine.” Do you think that would work?
Keystone Glass
Keystone Cap
Keystone Beer
Carmel Indiana has an Art Fair downtown every year which is a nice way to spend a few hours and a few dollars. This year we were shopping for a couple of presents when lo and behold, out front of Old Town Tavern, was this big bottle of Fuzzy’s Ultra Premium Vodka. Turns out it is the renowned golfer Fuzzy Zoeller’s creation. It’s 5 times distilled and 10 times charcoal filtered. Of course, as you could expect the slogan is “Get Fuzzy!”
Fuzzy’s Vodka
Bethany Beach has many good shops and places to explore. It was a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours browsing around the shops. The experience was much difference than the shops in Ocean City, Maryland, where we rented a condo for the week. We stopped at a coffee place but then found this shop selling gelato. A nice cone outside.
Bethany Beach Gelato
On our way home from the Badlands, seek we were driving through South Dakota and naturally had to stop at the Corn Palace. What a place! This spectacular site in Mitchell, SD has been around for over 100 years, actually this is the 3rd Corn Palace. The Palace is redecorated each year with naturally colored corn and other grains and native grasses to make it “the agricultural show-place of the world.” Go inside and you are treated to many corn specialities. Across the street you can find this cute little corn.
Corn Palace Corn
Sac City, Iowa – what a place. A small town (pop. 2,086) located in the rolling hills of Northwestern Iowa has a major claim to fame. You can find the “Worlds Largest Popcorn Ball” enclosed in a glass fronted building. It was created at Nobles Popcorn Farm on February 28, 2009 by 253 volunteers. The ball is built from 900 lbs of popcorn, 2,700 lbs of sugar (yum) and 1,400 lbs of syrup and water. I guess if I lived in Northwestern Iowa in February I would be one of the volunteers for sure. I love popcorn!
Sac City Popcorn Ball
I researched Iowa Big Things and knew about this metal corn cob, however I was running short of time and was on my way to the Big Nickel in Iowa City. But as life works out, we drove right by this special metal corn cob. I drove around the block and stopped to get this beauty. Where else but in Iowa does someone have a Big Metal Corn statue. I love it!
Heavy Metal Corn
Spotted this Big Coney Island on A1A in Indialantic, Florida on our way to the condo we rented for a few days following Ernie and Sally’s wedding in Orlando. We went back to get the photo and since we like a sale we picked up 4 of the Coney’s. Wanted to see if they were actually “Udderly Delicious” – not bad, but not Detroit style coneys either.
Florida Coney
This Big Coffee Pot is on US-30, the Lincoln Highway, in Bedford, PA. It was designed and built in 1927 by Bert Koontz to stand out front of his gas station. It served snacks and ice cream until 1937 when it became a restaurant and bar. There was once a Greyhound bus stop there providing plenty of customers. It was moved to it’s current spot in 2004.
Pennsylvania Coffee Pot
This is Woody the Root Beer Man in Oglesby, Illinois. Wow, a drive-in! I was holding my root beer float when Henry Moore – that’s M-double O-R-E, (he made a point of getting the spelling right) introduced himself. Makes you wonder how many times he delivered that line. At any rate he was delightful. He owned the restaurant for 50 years, purchased it after WWII, and then sold to his son. Now he is an employee. This was a man living his dream. Thanks Mr. M-double O-R-E. The float was good too.
Woody the Root Beer Man
At some point during a prolonged car trip, like this one through eastern Wisconsin, there comes a point – well you know the rest. Going after this Big Silo was one of those points. All this for a pretty lousy Big Thing shot. On top of that Meyer’s Market was equally disappointing.
Wisconsin Pumpkin Silo
On the Wisconsin trip I wanted to stop at the Mustard Museum in Mt. Horab. We planned to stop there on Saturday morning. At breakfast in the Wisconsin Dells Friday morning the USA Today I bought to get the Soduko featured a story on the museum – it was National Mustard Day Saturday! Mt Horab was planning a big blowout since the Museum was moving to another town. Anyway, when we got there Main Street was blocked off for the celebration. Food, drinks and a good time, too bad we couldn’t stay longer.
Mustard Museum 2
Mustard Museum
The Oscar Mayer car was there, of course. And Mr. Mustard as well. I can’t begin to tell you how much unexpected fun this experience was. They even had a car show, of course all the cars were painted mustard yellow. Are you ready for a good pun. This cheese photo makes for a pretty “cheesey” photo. Get it? Not much to get anyway was there?
Cheesy Photo
Southbound from the Wisconsin Dells we were cruising down US-12 to get a Muffler Man in Baraboo. We never did find the Muffler Man – turns out it was laying in pieces behind a wall. Anyway, we spotted the Big Corn in front of Mark’s Market. Did a quick u-turn and pulled into the open air market. After introducing ourselves Mark invited us to take all the photos we wanted. That’s when we noticed the Big Strawberry. Not quite as large as the one in Indiana but good size all the same. They also gave us the tip on the Big Bed which can be found on the Big Objects page.
Mark’s Market Strawberry
Mark’s Market Corn
Seymour, Wisconsin claims it is the home of the hamburger – and they have a statue of Charlie to prove it. See him in the Big People section. Across the street is this grill that cooked the World’s Largest Hamburger. I think the burger is a replica now to stand up to the Wisconsin winters. Seymour was planning a “Burger Fiesta” for August 8th. We were too early, maybe some other time.
Seymour Hamburger
Would you like some fries with your hot dog? This group of 4 images were part of the jackpot at Mel Schettl Sales outside Oshkosh, Wisconsin. My, how many big things. It was nearly overwhelming for Big Thingologists like Deb and me. We left feeling battle fatigue. I didn’t even get a image of the Jolly Green Giant you see in the background. After leaving Mel’s I had a taste for pizza. Vegetarian by the way. Where does your favorite pizza come from? I grew up in Detroit, down the street from Shields Bar which later became famous for the deep dish type pizza. My good friend Frank Parachetti was one of the pizza makers at Buddy’s which had the same style. Buddy’s bar was an old style Italian bar with a bocci court on the side of the building.
This Big Ice Cream carton is part of an ensemble. Together with a Big Cow (for the story on getting this image see info on my Big Cows page) which is part of a traveling promotional event sponsored by Turkey Hill Dairy. Mounted on a trailer along with the cow it travels around the country. Thanks, Karen!
Turkey Hill Ice Cream