Colonel Sanders Graveside

Editor's note: Blue MauMau is created in such a way that many kinds of blogs can be created and shared by members — e.g., advice columns, news summaries and op-ed blogs. They can include a personal journal, something that the word "blog" or personal web log originally referred to. Each registered member (free) on Blue MauMau has their own blog page on which all their blog entries appear. Here's an example of a personal journal type blog. We'd love to hear from our readers on their personal experiences on things touching upon franchising.

A Private Visit to the Colonel's Grave Turns into a News Story — Almost

Colonel Harland Sanders and his wife are buried at Cave Hill Cemetery in Louisville, Kentucky.

I took a drive and visited the site Sunday afternoon. The Colonel, founder of Kentucky Fried Chicken, is such a famous icon that there's a yellow line that leads tourists right to his graveside.

Despite the yellow line ending right at Mr. and Mrs. Sanders' resting place, I missed the site the first pass around.

After finding it, I took the photo above. With the Colonel sporting a Santa cap and a Christmas wreath, it looked like some fan or groundskeeper was still in a holiday mood.

A car pulled up with two Shih Tzu dogs barking from the dashboard of a 30-year-old Kentucky bluegrass version of a Humvee.

"Do ya' see the PETA headstone next to the Colonel's grave?," the driver asked.

"Huh!?!," I said.

"Sorry. I saw yo' camera and assumed you war' reportin' on the PETA headstone. I'll drive to the guardhouse and find out thar'."

"Huh???," I said again.

But he and his Shih Tzus were already on their way.

I thought, "Don, this is your lucky day. It can't get better than this for a reporter. I'm getting news stories thrown at me, even when I'm a tourist."

The franchise journalist in me sprung into action. With the aid of my cell phone, I found out in real time that the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals some nine days earlier had managed to sneak in a headstone with the name of one of PETA's leaders and a vague message.

U.S. News & World Report describes the event this way:

"Matt Prescott, PETA's anti-KFC boss, has just put up his tombstone three sections from the Colonel. On it is a 16-line acrostic poem, with letters down the left side reading, "KFC tortures birds."

Note to self, look up the word acrostic. Show off.

I looked for the tombstone. But the grave commemorating the chicken kingdom's version of Abu Ghraib was nowhere to be found.

After negotiating Louisville's resting place of long-gone dignitaries and even Confederate soldiers, I arrived at a gate with two security guards.

I asked about the stone.

A guard replied, "We moved that PETA headstone on the same day it went in. They tried to fool us. Hah! It's gone now. You can't tell where the tombstone was placed. And I cannot take you there because this cemetery is now closed for the day."

And with that, the story and photo opportunity disappeared as fast as it came. Fortunately, others have already reported on it.

Here's what the local news said on the day it occured: PETA Headstone Contains Anti-KFC Secret Recipe.

And here's a picture of the PETA tombstone and its message — before it was promptly removed.