Independence Day Philly Style

     For those of you who live in and around the City of Brotherly Love this won't be news to you.  But to the rest of the world it may come as a surprise that Philadelphia doesn't celebrate Independence Day just on July the 4th.  No, it's a week long event, well, actually 8 days, starting on June 27 and concluding with fireworks like you have never seen above the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in front of the Art Museum.

     Yesterday I attended one of the events that took place on Independence Mall.  That's located between the National Constitution Center and Independence Hall.  It was the Wawa Hoagie Day Celebration.  And once again, locals will know exactly what a Wawa and a Hoagie are.  But to those who aren't from around here you may have to Google those two words.  But let me try to explain.  A Wawa is a convenience store that sells things like coffee, drinks, newspapers, chips and sandwiches.  There are around 500 of them in this Mid-Atlantic region.  Some even sell gasoline at pumps located out in front of the store.  Wawa is the name of a very small town in Delaware County where the concept all began.  It's the Lenni Lenape Native American word for wild goose, as seen on their logo.

And when it comes to making and selling sandwiches, Wawa stores are the best at making Hoagies, an iconic sandwich of Philadelphia.  They are built on a long roll of varying lengths, anywhere from 4 inches to 3 feet and are stuffed with a variety of different kinds of meat, cheeses, lettuce, tomatoes, onions and hot peppers if you wish.  

Today's celebration was sponsored by Wawa and they made 23,000 hoagies that were distributed free to anyone who showed up.  Some of their employees arrived at 4:30am to begin making them.  Others arrived just before noon to hand them out.  The Hoagie Salute honored our service men and women from all branches of the military during all terms of conflict.

The Hoagies were delivered in six foot long boxes to be dispensed to the public for nearly 2 hours.  Old people, young people, firefighters, police, day care kids all got to enjoy a free lunch that included: a hoagie, a bag of chips, a bottle of iced tea or lemonade, and a TastyKake Krimpet.  

OK, that will be the next vocabulary word for those not familiar with Krimpets...