Bush Town Holds Eating Contest, Too

Sonya
Thomas, of Alexandria, Va., eats lobster on her way to winning the
World Lobster Eating Championship, Saturday, Aug. 21, 2004, in Kennebunk,
Maine. Thomas ate 9.76 pounds, the equivalent of 38 lobsters, in 12
minutes. (AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty)

At the conclusion of our current four-week commitment
to a dozen teenaged Japanese small-town business undergraduates. we
are looking forward to spending a few days with the Dowbrigade Mom,
loyal reader and insightful commenter, up in Downeast Maine. While
there, we will inevitably have a number of close encounters with the
red crustaceans. Although fresh lobsters are available all up and down
the
Eastern seaboard,
they somehow seem more succulent in Maine. This is probably an illusory
effect created by the persistent marketing campaign run by the
Maine
Tourism Board to associate the state with delicious critters, but knowing
that makes them no less delicious.

However, lobsters were not always held in such high
esteem.  From the Colonial period until the early 20th century, people
in Boston thought the King of Crustaceans was considered fit only
for pig food and fertilizer. In fact, local legend holds that during
the
1700’s
there were prison riots at the Colonial-era prison on an Island in
Boston Harbor because the prisoners rebelled against a steady diet
of – Lobster.
They probably  scrimped on the drawn butter.

from AP