The groundwork has been laid for a sunrise ceremony Monday when international woodchuck celebrity Punxsutawney Phil’s annual long-term weather forecast will be announced — six more weeks of winter or an early spring.
Tens of thousands of revelers will be descending on Gobbler’s Knob in rural Pennsylvania to witness this year’s prognostication, which will be made after groundhog Phil gets brought to the stage from his hatch on a tree stump.
Last year’s announcement was six more weeks of winter, by far Phil’s more common assessment and not much of a surprise during the first week of February. His top-hatted handlers in the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club insist Phil’s “groundhogese” of winks, purrs, chatters and nods are being interpreted when they relate the meteorological marmot’s musings about the days ahead.
Groundhogs are generally solitary creatures that emerge in midwinter to find a mate. When Phil is deemed to have not seen his shadow, that is said to usher in an early spring. When he does see it, there will be six more weeks of winter.
This is the first Groundhog Day for Phil’s new “zoo” at Gobbler’s Knob, where he splits time when he’s not inside his longstanding home beside the town library.
The national popularity of Groundhog Day was supercharged by the 1993 Bill Murray film of the same name. Mostly it’s a few hours of harmless, early morning fun — although alcohol is no longer allowed at the site after a series of unfortunate incidents.
“We just like to remind people that there’s a lot of serious things in this world and this life, and Groundhog Day is not one of them,” said home appraiser Dan McGinley, a member of the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club’s Inner Circle for about a decade. “We take not taking ourselves too seriously, seriously. But seriously, this is not a serious thing.”
Groundhog Day has also become a marketing juggernaut. Phil was brought out for an online news conference last week at which he and a couple tuxedo-wearing club members fielded questions about the event, its history and the planning that goes into it.
Michael Venos, a 46-year-old database administrator from Roxbury, New Jersey, has been collecting stories of Groundhog Day events and their weather predictions for about a decade. A groundhog who lived behind his boyhood home became a sort of unofficial family pet, and Venos was further inspired by seeing the popular movie.
“Plus the underdog-ness of the holiday. It’s not quite at your A-level holiday. So that kind of appeals to me, too,” said Venos, who has tallied more than 300 Groundhog Day prognosticators since the 1880s. His own Groundhog Day routine? Venos’ family usually makes groundhog cupcakes and he and his daughters hold a backyard prediction ceremony with groundhog sock puppets.
Last year alone there were more than 100 weather predictions, Venos said. Along with the many groundhogs, the winter forecasts were credited to an armadillo, ostriches, and Nigerian dwarf goats. His website lists their memorable names — among them Cluxatawney Henrietta (New York), Lucy the Lobster (Nova Scotia), Scramble the Duck (Connecticut) and Snerd (North Carolina).
Punxsutawney club members say there are two types of people who show up at Phil’s spot about 80 miles (123 kilometers) northeast of Pittsburgh — those seeking to validate their beliefs and doubters who want to confirm their own skepticism.
Groundhog Day falls on Feb. 2, the midpoint between the shortest, darkest day of the year on the winter solstice and the spring equinox. It’s a time of year that also figures in the Celtic calendar and the Christian holiday of Candlemas.
Pennsylvanians of German descent have been watching for the annual emergence from hibernation of groundhogs for centuries. A culture of clubs and celebrations grew up around the tradition in the U.S., Canada and beyond.
In Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania Germans began celebrating the holiday in the 1880s by picnicking, hunting and eating groundhogs. Safe to say it’s a history about which Phil, his “wife” Phyllis and their two pups, Shadow and Sunny, would surely prefer to remain ignorant.