On today's (4/30) rant/rave thread, people have noted that the "World's Biggest Ball of String" seems to be in a number of towns at once! This reminded me of the sign outside Onawa, IA, claiming it has the wides Main Street in the country. Others have told me that THEIR town has the widest Main Street.

How many of you know of towns that make that claim?

And, BTW, is the Biggest Ball of String bigger than the Biggest Ball of Elastic Bands?

Sorry, wasn't rant/rave thread, it was the "is that it?" thread, but same issue...

Can't answer your question, but it reminded me of the "biggest little city in the world" Reno, NV.

I've always heard that Canal Street in New Orleans was the widest street in the world. It is pretty wide, as anyone attending Mardi Gras would attest.....

Not my home town but been through there many times....Waunakee WI is advertised as the only Waunakee in the world.

My second home of Franklin, NC is called, "The Gem Capital of the World". I'm not sure if it is or not.

Keene New Hampshire claims to have the widest main street in the USA. ???

Widest Main St or widest main street? Does the Champs Elysees count?

I've also heard that Canal Street in N.O. is America's widest street but I'm not sure if it's true or not. It's accepted as fact around here!

San Francisco shopping centre has the only spiral escalators, not sure the only in US or World. Not that I'm proud of it, just adding to the list of silly statistics.

Asheville is home to America's largest house, the Biltmore Estate, with 255 rooms.

People in Toronto like to say that Yonge Street, the main north-south street in the city, is the longest street in the world because it extends north and then west all the way to Thunder Bay, passing through lots of communities where it is the main street.

It seems to me it's just a highway that grows out of a very long main street (it really is long, from Toronto harbor north at least thirty miles with the same name)

And Toronto does have the tallest freestanding structure in the world, the CN Tower.

And there's a giant fake apple, with a stairway to the top and a great view of a multi-lane highway, near Cobourg, between Toronto and Kingston (east end of Lake Ontario) Excellent apple pie is sold there, apparently.

And in Sudbury, north of Toronto a couple of hundred miles, is the largest nickel in the world, at the INCO nickel mine. that's it, I think, for biggest in Ontario, Canada, I think. (Niagara Falls may be the biggest by some dimension or measurement)

You may or may not believe me, yet Petaluma CA is the "pothole" capitol of the world. Some smart fella even put a billboard up on Hwy 101 and many folks
have stickers on their cars saying
"Save the potholes!"
A Proud Petaluman
R5

My town is The Home of Little League Baseball, does that count?

My town's claim to fame is the "Longest burning Light Bulb" in history and I've seen it!

http://www.centennialbulb.org/

Utahtea

My hometown boasts the largest blooming plant in the world, the Sirre Madre Wisteria vine. Ironically, as an adult, I moved a few miles east and my daughter was raised in city whose claims to fame include the largest Bougainvillea growth in the US.

Forbes Street in the town of Trundle, New South Wales, claims the title for Australia at 60 metres (for the metrically-challenged, 197 feet). It was designed to allow a full bullock team to execute a U-turn. By report the residents prefer to drive rather than walk when they cross the street.

I can't say how this compares with Onawa IA - the town's website claims the honour for America (in addition to inventing the Eskimo Pie, whatever that is) but seems to be a bit coy with numbers.

For the record, New South Wales is our fourth largest state and yes, it's bigger than Texas.

Was it the town in the movie "Drop Dead Gorgeous" that claimed the state's "oldest living Lutheran" - except that she'd died some time back?

Atlanta-home of Coca-Cola

I love these posts, but for Neil_Oz:
You don't know what an Eskimo Pie is????? Thirty slaps with a vegemite sandwich! It's chocolate-covered vanilla ice cream on a stick, and unfortunately its clone, the Klondike Bar, is now better known in the states, along with some others made by gourmet candy companies. The original was made with the highest-possible butterfat-content ice cream and extremely rich chocolate -- some of the clones are also, but there have been many made with abominations like ice milk or frozen yogurt.

The day it was introduced to Onawa, the temperature had (by legend, anyway) reached 112F (44.4 C. for the Farenheit-challenged) and the bars sold out immediately, with raves not only for flavor but for comparative "neatness" compared to ice cream cones in the searing heat.

While we're at it about Onawa, it's also the point of origin of RAGRAI, the [Des Moines] Register [newspaper]'s Annual Great Bicycle Race Across Iowa.

As to Main Street, Onawa, there's photo of their welcome sign at http://www.phoons.com/onawa.html .

Keene, NH also claims the same honor. So does Abingdon, IL, which holds an annual Gymkhana "When Main Street Goes Awry" -- you'll love the music at http://www.chicagolandmgclub.com/abingdon/autox.html . And also claiming the widest main street, there's Canandaigua NY. Canadians in Colborne say their Main St. is the widest in Canada.

On NONE of the websites for these places did I find any actual measurements!

Rave on, my friends!

That would be RAGBRAI, which draws cyclists from around the country.