Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, July 31, 1994 TAG: 9408040003
SECTION: CURRENT PAGE: NRV-2 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Madelyn Rosenberg
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
This year, I write it with glee and before the September due date, having found solutions to three of life's greatest mysteries during one short weekend in Tennessee.
I always have professed to hate the "educational summer vacation," though in actuality, I survived Gettysburg, Amish Country and Williamsburg with fond memories and nary a scar. And though ginger snaps and a Betsy-Ross style cap remain my most vivid memories of those trips, back then I could dash off enough information about pilgrims, Civil War generals, and horses and buggies to satisfy any teacher, first grade through eighth.
This year, it was not a trip to a historic battlefield, but to Chattanooga. Still, it was a city brimming with knowledge and the answer to Mystery No. 1: How did Moon Pies and RC Cola become forever linked?
The answer lies within the walls of Chattanooga Bakery Inc., which holds the registered trademark of the Moon Pie.
Four inches in diameter, it was the biggest snack you could find on the shelves back when everything cost a nickel, said Sam Campbell IV, president of the company, who is himself too young to remember back quite that far.
Coca-Cola, at the time, came in small bottles. RC came in big ones.
When farmers and other workers would come into mom and pop stores (when there were mom and pop stores) at the end of a hard day, they would buy the biggest snack and drink combination they could find. And that, Campbell said, was RC and a Moon Pie.
Mystery No. 2: You've seen it before, that lone piece of luggage, rotating round and round on the baggage carousel. Where does it go if no one ever claims it?
To Scottsboro, Ala., of course.
My friend Ruth and I learned this at the Alabama Visitors Center, which was the nicest visitors center we've ever seen. Ruth figures Alabama realizes it has a slight image problem (It's abused nearly as much as West Virginia), and wants to make a good first impression.
At any rate, the women there told us where to find Alabama shopping at its finest. In Scottsboro, three buildings sit side by side, named, appropriately, Unclaimed Baggage. Inside, there are shelves of suitcases, racks of clothing and bins of sunglasses and Walkmans.
Underwear is also in huge supply either because a) everyone packs a little extra underwear for a trip or b) no one's in the market for someone else's old underwear.
Personnel there are not allowed to discuss the business - an agreement with the airlines, they said. But the visitors center reports that Unclaimed Baggage is the country's largest purchaser of unclaimed baggage. And they pass out brochures that say so.
These brochures do not tout a smaller business, also in Scottsboro. Down the road a piece from Unclaimed baggage, the sign next to the building reads, in red paint ``Unclaimed Mini Storage.''
And finally, Mystery No. 3: How did the hush puppy get its name?
We learned this from the folks at Uncle Bud's Catfish, Chicken and Such, where on your birthday you will receive a Moon Pie with a candle in it.
According to the Catfish Chronicle (a publication we believe is written by Uncle Bud himself), the term came about in the olden days when yard dogs would hang out around plantation kitchens, whining for scraps. The cooks started frying up pieces of cornmeal that they would throw to the dogs to keep 'em quiet. Thus the name "hush puppy."
(For people, Uncle Bud adds some extra onion, buttermilk and spices.)
And there you have it, a summer essay that would have knocked the socks off some of my old teachers - or at least, I hope, amused them. I can afford to amuse them now. After all, I'm not getting graded.
Madelyn Rosenbergis the Roanoke Times & World-News' assistant New River editor.
by CNB