Abraham Lincoln and Liberty the Pig, on a base donated by Jon Corzine
Technically I’m on vacation right now, but I was checking my e-mail and want to share one that arrived today — from Jon Corzine’s pig.
If you read the story Where Corzine Is Welcome Back, you know that former New Jersey governor Jon Corzine, before he ran MF Global into the ground in the largest Wall Street firm failure since Lehman Brothers, performed a real service for mankind: he helped erect the world’s only statue of Abraham Lincoln and a pig. While another benefactor paid for the statue, Corzine paid for the granite base upon which Lincoln and the pig now stand in Taylorville, Ill., near where Corzine was raised.
The bronze pig supposedly has some lucky powers that go to work when you rub its nose. It has brought some luck to a real-life, formerly orphaned potbelly pig that now lives happily in Taylorville and serves as the town’s mascot. Both pigs are named Liberty, and the living pig is tickled to be associated with Jon Corzine. He (or she?) sends these greetings from Corzine’s hometown*:
Dear Miss Lambert,
I have received lots of comments from your story about native son Jon Corzine. Real people are pea green because you included me — a humble but proud pig — along with my forebear’s bronze statue.
Even though I am just a pig, I have a lot of weight on my shoulders to help pull our city out of economic hardship.
I believe Taylorville is the only city in the USA with a live pig as a mascot. If more and more people come here to rub the nose of Lincoln’s bronze pig for good luck, prosperity may return in the New Year.
Please come visit as soon as you can….. lots of people would like to share their real life stories of what the American heartland is really like. There is hope. For months, I was a starving, homeless piglet on the run and now I am the official tourism ambassador with my own condo! It is an All-American story. If I can make it, anyone can!
I can’t wait to show you my favorite trick — pushing my big exercise ball around the yard on my hind legs. People actually line up along the fence to watch me. They squeal just like me!
I wish you and yours all the best for Christmas and the New Year.
Liberty
Liberty, I would love to visit Taylorville in 2012 (it looks like fun) and will try to get there soon. Season’s Greetings to you, to all your friends in Taylorville, and to everyone else out there who may be reading.
*Ok, to be technical, Corzine was raised just up the road from Taylorville in unincorporated Willey Station, but he attended high school in Taylorville.
Via: Forbes
