The sign on the doorknob said “Privacy Please,” and yet the turkeys had none. Visitors were regular. Photos were incessant. Wood chips spilled into the hallway, and if that wasn’t a giveaway, then the occasional gobblegobble was. By Monday evening the most famous birds in America had taken roost in the Willard Intercontinental, in a room that rents to humans for about $400 per night. The vestibule had been tarped and cordoned off. A bottle of Fiji water was on the bureau, just out of pecking distance.
They are beasts, these white broad-breasted lunks of feather. At eye level they have a baleful, beady-eyed glare. Their heads are a cascade of guts-colored wattle, their snoods a wriggling indignity astride pale beaks. They seem either profoundly stupid or capable of great evil, as if they are moments away from dozing off or springing into attack mode.
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President Obama cracked a few jokes before pardoning Popcorn the turkey as part of a White House Thanksgiving tradition Wednesday.
“The little guy in the back has a little more wattle, and it’s a deeper red,” says John Burkel, president of the National Turkey Federation, trying to differentiate the two for a layman. Burkel raised the pair on his family farm way up in the noggin of Minnesota, in a town called Badger, population 375, unless you count Burkel’s turkeys, in which case it’s maybe 10,000, depending on how many flocks of turkeys are alive at any given time.
The president of the federation provides the turkeys for the president to pardon the day before Thanksgiving. It’s one of the country’s inane, necessary rituals, like singing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” during the seventh-inning stretch, even though everyone’s already at a ball game.
Besides being boffo publicity for the turkey industry, and a vexing charade in the minds of animal rights activists, and a platform from which writers squawk about the grip of Big Agriculture and the actual humans who deserve real clemency, the turkey pardon is — “a chance for people who aren’t involved with growing food to keep in touch with where it comes from,” says Peter Gruhl, a customer service representative for Hybrid Turkeys, which hatched the pair in question July 8 and then sent them as day-old poults to the Burkel farm to be raised into meaty almost-entrees.
While the rest of their flock of 8,000 were sent to “the plant” in Thief River Falls, Minn., for death and dismemberment, the spared pair were chauffeured by Gruhl in a minivan to the capital on Monday. The turkeys took turns resting their heads on Gruhl’s shoulder, he says, and pecking his backside when they wanted water.
On Tuesday morning, the turkeys gave a news conference. Or, rather, they stood on a black rug in the Crystal Room off the Willard lobby as the media questioned their farmer.
A journalist asked whether the turkeys have distinct personalities, and Burkel said they did not, at least not when they were in a flock.
A journalist asked whether they liked pop music, and Burkel said he played them Vivaldi and John Mayer — presumably to get the turkeys used to hard-core strings and soft-core lyrics.
By this time, the White House had set up a Web site — an operational one, mind you — for the turkeys, whom it had named Popcorn and Caramel. The public was encouraged to vote for #TeamPopcorn or #TeamCaramel on social media, depending on which turkey looked like it deserved the title of “National Thanksgiving Turkey.” The vote wasn’t life-or-death, because both Popcorn and Caramel would be pardoned. And given the life span for these types of turkeys, both will probably be dead in two years or less anyway.
They are beasts, these white broad-breasted lunks of feather. At eye level they have a baleful, beady-eyed glare. Their heads are a cascade of guts-colored wattle, their snoods a wriggling indignity astride pale beaks. They seem either profoundly stupid or capable of great evil, as if they are moments away from dozing off or springing into attack mode.
Video
President Obama cracked a few jokes before pardoning Popcorn the turkey as part of a White House Thanksgiving tradition Wednesday.
“The little guy in the back has a little more wattle, and it’s a deeper red,” says John Burkel, president of the National Turkey Federation, trying to differentiate the two for a layman. Burkel raised the pair on his family farm way up in the noggin of Minnesota, in a town called Badger, population 375, unless you count Burkel’s turkeys, in which case it’s maybe 10,000, depending on how many flocks of turkeys are alive at any given time.
The president of the federation provides the turkeys for the president to pardon the day before Thanksgiving. It’s one of the country’s inane, necessary rituals, like singing “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” during the seventh-inning stretch, even though everyone’s already at a ball game.
Besides being boffo publicity for the turkey industry, and a vexing charade in the minds of animal rights activists, and a platform from which writers squawk about the grip of Big Agriculture and the actual humans who deserve real clemency, the turkey pardon is — “a chance for people who aren’t involved with growing food to keep in touch with where it comes from,” says Peter Gruhl, a customer service representative for Hybrid Turkeys, which hatched the pair in question July 8 and then sent them as day-old poults to the Burkel farm to be raised into meaty almost-entrees.
While the rest of their flock of 8,000 were sent to “the plant” in Thief River Falls, Minn., for death and dismemberment, the spared pair were chauffeured by Gruhl in a minivan to the capital on Monday. The turkeys took turns resting their heads on Gruhl’s shoulder, he says, and pecking his backside when they wanted water.
On Tuesday morning, the turkeys gave a news conference. Or, rather, they stood on a black rug in the Crystal Room off the Willard lobby as the media questioned their farmer.
A journalist asked whether the turkeys have distinct personalities, and Burkel said they did not, at least not when they were in a flock.
A journalist asked whether they liked pop music, and Burkel said he played them Vivaldi and John Mayer — presumably to get the turkeys used to hard-core strings and soft-core lyrics.
By this time, the White House had set up a Web site — an operational one, mind you — for the turkeys, whom it had named Popcorn and Caramel. The public was encouraged to vote for #TeamPopcorn or #TeamCaramel on social media, depending on which turkey looked like it deserved the title of “National Thanksgiving Turkey.” The vote wasn’t life-or-death, because both Popcorn and Caramel would be pardoned. And given the life span for these types of turkeys, both will probably be dead in two years or less anyway.