In the center of Main St in Enterprise, Alabama is a Boll Weevil Monument.
A monument.
To the boll weevil.
An insect.
A pest.
One that destroys cotton.
And there’s a monument to it in a southern state.
There’s a good reason that Enterprise built the Boll Weevil Monument though – it helped to save their economy.
In 1915, the boll weevil first showed up in Alabama. Within just three years, the insect was destroying entire crops and taking the area’s economy with it.
A year after the boll weevil first appeared, a local farmer was persuaded to plant peanuts – a crop that wasn’t affected by the boll weevil. The experiment was a success, so other farmers soon followed his lead. They continued growing cotton, but the diversification into peanuts and other crops helped ensure that the local economy was no longer reliant on a sole product.
To celebrate the saving of the economy, a local businessman proposed building a monument to the boll weevil. December 11, 1919 saw its unveiling in the middle of Main St in Enterprise.
Despite being a monument to the boll weevil, it didn’t have a boll weevil on it originally – only the female statue. It took three decades for a boll weevil to be added, atop a trophy held over her head.
The boll weevil monument was vandalized many times after being erected in 1919. That eventually resulted in the city removing the monument in 1998 and displaying it in the Enterprise Depot Museum. A replica was erected in its place which is what we got to see during our recent visit.
The monument is also the destination for the World’s Smallest St Patrick’s Day Parade that takes place in the city on March 17 every year. The parade was the reason we were in Enterprise and got to see the Boll Weevil Monument – we’ll have more about the parade tomorrow.
It seems the peanut , the “good”, would have been honored with a statue over the insect, the “bad” yet either way they are both kind of “ugly”. Love the story, history and the outcome for this beautiful community.