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Originally Posted by jmen24
On to the symbol topic. My feeling is that the Old Man is gone and that name has been retired. If we put up a new one, at what point does the New Man become an Old Man.
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I've lived in this state my entire life. May 3, 2003 is a day I will always remember as the day that I lost a dear friend.
I am relieved that the expense of engineering and fabricating a replacement Old Man is prohibitive. Just as things can go from good to bad in an eye's blinking moment, an icon can be reduced to a cartoon if it is the will of men.
To be sure, the spirit of what is symbolized can outlast the symbol itself. If the irascible, flinty, rugged form of individualistic self-reliance that the Old Man stood for since the last Ice Age is a value we believe should be cherished, it should be so.
The Old Man died in a spring avalanche 7 years ago. It's up to us to determine if what he stood for is still relevant.
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The Mount Washington is a good idea, but so many people in the state cannot relate to it, I happen to like the idea.
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I'll commit heresy and suggest that this is not a good statewide symbol - for the very reason you provide.
NH is a state of almost tribal regional loyalties. Folks in the Keene area have little in common with folks in the Lakes. Seacoast-area residents have more connection to Mass. or Maine than their Granite State brethren in the Upper Valley. And so on and so forth.
The notable exception is that we all have some kind of affinity towards the White Mountains. One of the functions of the Old Man was his power to kinda "unBalkanize," making us more of a people with a common heritage - and less a collection of various sub-regions.