The Concordian

Issue date: 2/3/10 Section: News

This year's Grand Groundhog Watcher Beverly Wellman and Interim Vice President of Advancement Greg Quick with Concord's resident groundhogs. [Click to enlarge]

Concord Charlie [Click to enlarge]

"We are given the choice to take things for granted or … to choose to make things better," concluded Greg Quick, interim vice president of advancement, as he summarized the Bill Murray Groundhog Day movie to open Concord University's 32nd Annual Groundhog Day Breakfast.

The Groundhog Watchers, over one hundred in attendance, gathered early Tuesday morning in the Jerry L. Beasley Student Center Ballroom to observe the tradition and fellowship steeped in Concord Charlie's prediction. The observers were led in ceremony by this year's Grand Groundhog Watcher Beverly Wellman, retired executive director of the Mercer County Convention & Visitors Bureau.

"The breakfast started to promote Appalachian Studies and the region…she has worked so hard to promote both," said Quick of Wellman's selection to this year's Grand Groundhog Watcher.

Wellman joked of antics and disguises she had to use to spy whether Concord Charlie would see his shadow or not. "Concord Charlie was bashful…he was doggone reclusive," said Wellman jokingly while showing those in attendance her various props, such as a clown wig, sunglasses, and her "trusty binoculars."

As she finished with her witty humor, Wellman reflected on her experience with Concord, "The students are very dedicated and destined to do great things."

Once the hour approached and Wellman relinquished the podium, Greg Quick began the process to announce Charlie's verdict.

Quick began with a reading from a mid-nineteenth century Pennsylvanian storekeeper's diary that reflected the origin of Groundhog Day in the U.S. and transitioned into an English poem from Scotland:

"As the light grows longer

The cold grows stronger

If Candlemas be fair and bright

Winter will have another flight

If Candlemas be cloud and snow

Winter will be gone and not come again

A farmer should on Candlemas day

Have half his corn and half his hay

On Candlemas day if thorns hang a drop

You can be sure of a good crop"

Upon completion of the poem, Quick, filling in for an ill Dr. Gregory Aloia, received a phone call from Pennsylvania for Charlie. After holding his cell phone to the gopher's ear, the gopher in turn whispered back into Quick's ear that the shadow was not seen and that there would be an early spring.

So as we think of the snow and sleet of yesterday, we can look forward to the warm weather and early spring promised by Concord's resident gopher.

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