Herbert Hoover promised “Two chickens in every pot”, if he were elected president in 1928. The public voted Herby in as commander-in-chief, and the good times lasted until 1929, and the Wall Street crash. A fowl blow on the nation’s economy, as most of its citizens were plucked free of their money. It was tough scratching out a living, while eating corn out of a bucket. A feather in the cap of Sen. Foghorn Leghorn, from the Red state of Rhode Island, for introducing a beak (bill) to authorize featherbedding on the nation’s railroads.
Congress chickened out (Yes, this essay will be full of chicken metaphors, but you knew that coming in), by using low-grade stuffing on birds less than 8 pounds, thereby allowing only one chicken per pot per citizen. Sen. Orrin Hatchery, the other white meat politician, took Joe Sixpack under his wing, and secretly installed a pop-up timer to remind him when to vote. The impact of the crash of 1929 prompted Variety, the Broadway newspaper, to use the headline “Wall Street lays an egg.” A parsnip packer named Percy Pinfeather was arrested for stuffing pillows with goose feathers (he was down on his luck). Years later, Percy was given a presidential pardon by Richard Henhous Nixon, himself a chicken plucker from San Clemente, California.
We’ll probably never figure out the chicken/ space time/egg/continuum conundrum; so we’ll just have to assume that it took place during the Big Bang Thingy. Eggs have defied the evolutionary changes that have affected virtually every other living thing. Eggs still look like eggs, and still have the same basic composition inside the shell. Eggs have infiltrated our language in very descriptive and the colorful ways. An embarrassed person would be said to have “egg on his face; a bad person is a “bad egg”, and when jumping into the swimming pool, someone would always shout, “last one in is a rotten egg!” To motivate a person would be “egging them on”, and a tough individual would be considered “hard-boiled”. On the positive side we decorate the brims on naval officers’ caps with “scrambled egg” braid; and the egg shares equal status as a breakfast companion to the carnivore choices of ham, bacon, and sausage. Every picnic menu must have deviled eggs, and there would always be a game of egg tossing.
The Broadway show “Best Little Whorehouse in Texas”, was based on the “Chicken Ranch” in La Grange Texas. This ranch was an illegal brothel that managed to stay in business from 1905 to 1973. If a person was challenged to do something daring, but then changed his mind; he would be called a chicken. He would have chickened out, and he would therefore be disgraced. A small sum of money is labeled as chicken feed.
Hall of Fame baseball player Wade Boggs ate chicken before every game. Every wedding worth attending, would stage a Chicken Dance. In our society; whether government or workplace, people would establish a pecking order of authority; thereby creating a harmonious and free-flowing environment. Chickens gave us this method.
In addition to the aforementioned contributions to civilization, chickens are damn good to eat! Volumes have been written suggesting how to best cook these wonderful birds; but insiders know “If it ain’t fried, it ain’t food!” Even high-end steakhouse and seafood restaurants will have a chicken entrée. Fast food burger restaurants, Mickey D’s and Burger King also offer a chicken delicacy. By contrast, fast food chicken outlets, KFC and Chick-fil-A, do not offer hamburgers. I find that very interesting, would you agree?
There are more chickens in the world that all the other bird species combined. It’s time to restore some dignity to this much maligned feathered creature. I would like to see a groundswell of interest supporting the idea of a chicken portrait on the two dollar bill, to replace the existing image of Thomas Jefferson! Okay!?!
Original or crispy?