The Price is White: The Big White Guy of Chicopee, Massachusetts sold at auction

For the past several decades, a friendly 30-foot fiberglass dude wearing a handsome white suit and hat has been a fixture around the greater Springfield, Massachusetts area, and since 1999 he has greeted motorists from his perch off the Massachusetts Turpike's Exit 6 off-ramp in front of the Plantation Inn in Chicopee. Back in 1970, a Mr. Mario Cantalini bought the Big White Guy, also known as Plantation Man or Southern Man (but not the Neil Young "Southern Man"), from a Framingham, Mass. pizza restaurant and converted him into an Uncle Sam for his Springfield Ford dealership. Then, in 1999, after he sold his dealership, he gave the big dude a monochromatic wardrobe makeover and moved him in front of  his new business, the Plantation Inn in Chicopee. Mr. Cantalini passed away last year at age 94, and now his relatives have closed the Inn and put the property, Big White Guy and all, up for auction last November. They didn't get their asking price for the Inn, but Big White Guy was sold for $11,500 to a Mr. Charlie Arment, Jr., a local businessman who bought the dude on behalf of a group of partners who plan to keep the statue somewhere in the greater Springfield area.

Good on you, Mr. Arment, for having your heart in the White place, being in the White place at the White time and doing the White thing by keeping Big White Guy local. You deserve a big hand.

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Do the White Thing: Chicopee, Massachusetts' Big White Guy

A tall, nattily-attired roadside giant greets you as you exit the Massachusetts Turnpike for Route 291 in Chicopee, Massachusetts, near Springfield. Some checking on the always helpful roadsideamerica.com informs us that in a former life, this gent was an Uncle Sam from a Ford dealership who was given a new, ivory-colored wardrobe and a change of venue in front of the Plantation Inn, whose catchphrase is "Southern Hospitality in New England." And what, may I ask, could be more hospitable than this Kentucky colonel sublimely grinning and giving you a friendly "Howdy" the minute you get off the Mass Pike? One might argue that pre-Civil War southern plantations aren't the best metaphor for hospitality, but I digress. It's hard to tell if Big White Guy is really the Plantation Inn's mascot, though, as there is no mention of him on their website (not capitalizing on such a draw is a marketing faux paux of no small order). In the mood to bowl a few frames? The Chicopee Lanes next door adds to the eccentric retro roadside greatness. If you think this place awesome, all we can say is you got that white.