Back in late March and early April I wrote about how the famed Muffler Man called the Gemini Giant was able to be saved for the City of Wilmington, Illinois. This is the rest of the article.
Businesses along Route 66 needed a way to stand out among the competition, and many bought the large, fiberglass statues for advertising.
These statues included lumberjacks, cowboys and eventually became roadside attractions in themselves. They later earned the nickname "Muffler Men" from the founders of the travel website RoadsideAmerica.com, who had seen some of the statues holding mufflers.
A former owner of the Wilmington, Illinois, restaurant The Dairy Delight, later renamed it The Launching Pad, bought the Gemini Giant in 1965, where it remained, said Joe Baker, founder of American Giants, a company dedicated to finding the statues and sharing their stories.
It has become one of the most famous and photographed Muffler Men, he said, and last remaining spaceman statue.
--RoadMuffler
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