A Change of Mind.
Two old friends were traveling across country on an extended fishing adventure. Their goal was to fish in some of the finest lakes and streams in America. They had fallen into deep discussion during one long period of driving and suddenly realized that they were not sure what state they were in. They had been in Missouri earlier, but pretty sure they were not in “the show me” state any longer.
Just then a sign came into view. “Welcome to Harpers, Population 475. A proud city. Spitting on the sidewalk is prohibited.”
The two men looked at each other simultaneously, and then spoke almost in unison, “Spitting on the sidewalk is prohibited?” They decided this needed more investigation.
In the center of town, they found a small café. After being seated and ordering coffee, one of the men asked the waitress about the sign.
“Why in the world would anyone put something about spitting on the sidewalk on their welcome sign?"
The waitress said, “Well, about 20 years ago there was a group of retirees, older gents like yourself, that used to hang around outside the drug store. As the day wore on, they would spin tall takes and chew tobacco. Invariably someone would challenge someone else to a spitting contest. You know, who could spit the farthest, the biggest stream, or hit a spot on the sidewalk. As you can imagine, it was not a pretty sight. Finally, the city council got together and passed a law that spitting on the sidewalk was prohibited.
“Since then all of those fellows have passed on, and no one really chews tobacco anymore, what with cancer and all. But the city decided to leave the law on the books. Eventually a big city newspaper writer heard about our little quirky law and came and wrote a story about it, even found some old pictures of the fellows in front of the drug store to use in the story. It really created a stir, and even brought some tourists to town fo
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