National Corndog Day
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
National Corndog Day is a celebration of basketball, the corn dog, tater tots, and American beer that occurs in March of every year on the first Saturday of the NCAA Men's Division I Basketball Championship. By 2007, parties celebrating National Corndog Day occurred at 113 locations in more than 30 U.S. states, the District of Columbia and Australia.
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[edit] Background
National Corndog Day always takes place on the Saturday when the NCAA men's basketball tournament has narrowed to 32 teams. (In 2007, that day is March 17). This is the only day of the year when network television in the United States broadcasts an uninterrupted quadruple-header of college basketball. Participants gather at party locations to watch the basketball games, eat corndogs and tater tots, and drink American-brewed beer. Most party locations track statistics for consumption of the day's offerings, with awards given for various levels of eating. Traditionally, the top prize awarded at every party location is the "Triple Double." Named for the basketball statistic of the same moniker, the Triple Double involves consuming double figures in all three categories of consumption: 10 corndogs, 10 beers, and 10 "units" of tater tots (100 tots total). Some party locations have added Quadruple Double awards for consumption of double-figures in a fourth category such as cookies, cupcakes, Twinkies or shots of hard liquor.
[edit] History
National Corndog Day was inaugurated in 1992 in Corvallis, Oregon by high-school students Brady Sahnow and Henry Otley. The first celebration was informal and involved simply corndogs and basketball. In subsequent years, National Corndog day was expanded to include tater tots and beer and gradually spread to other cities. Currently, the celebration is sponsored by Foster Farms, a Livingston, California-based poultry producer that supplies corndogs to each party location. Operations for National Corndog Day currently are governed by a board of directors consisting of select event hosts (or "city captains") based in various cities across the United States.
[edit] See also
[edit] References
- Mary Ann Albright, "Corndog Buffs Have Their Day," Corvallis Gazette-Times (Corvallis, Oregon), March 16, 2007, Top Story, Pg. 1.[1]
- Ricardo Baca, "Why I adore the lowly corn dog", Denver Post (Denver, CO), March 15, 2006, Sec. Food and Dining, [2].
- Staff, "Don't wait for the state fair to come back; make your own corn dogs", Anchorage Daily News, October 1, 2003, Sec. Life, Pg. D2.
- Su-Jin Yim, "Every Corndog Has Its (URP) Day", Oregonian (Portland, OR), March 16, 2002, Sec. Living, Pg. CO1.
- In Tidbits, The Gothamist, March 17, 2006 [3].
