December 11, 1913

The Polk County Possum Club got its start when attorney J. I. Alley wrote a letter to Mena (Polk County) mayor John H. Hamilton that read, in part: “The undersigned has recently seen and heard of much of your boastful conduct and self praise with reference to possum hunting…Therefore believing that others should share at least a part of those honors, I challenge you to a single or a series of possum hunts most suitable to yourself and those with whom you train.” The Polk County Possum Club (PCPC) henceforth hosted yearly banquets of opossum meat and side dishes until 1947 (although sporadically during World War II—during which time the county became dry), though it was active again for five years in the 1990s.