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Gus the
camel, draped in black, hesitates Monday as Shriners try to pull the
dromedary away from Louise Tanner's casket at Woodland Memorial Park
cemetery. Tanner, who died at 75, raised Gus from a calf in the front
yard of her east Orange County home, for the Bahia Shrine Camel Herders. |
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The miles Louise
Tanner walked were for a camel, a 2,300-pound dromedary by the name of
Gus that she raised from a calf in the front yard of her east Orange
County home.
So the sight of Gus, draped in black and
followed by pallbearers, brought tearful smiles from those who came to
Woodland Memorial Park on Monday to bury the 75 year old widow.
"It was really touching and sweet,"
Margaret Stephenson said of Gus' presence at the graveside service for
her sister. :we all cracked up with tears."
Tanner offered her front yard as a pasture 17
years ago, when the Bahia Shrine Camel Herders were shopping for a place
to keep their humped mascot.
John Hermsen, past president of the Maitland
fraternal group, said the Shriners acquired the former circus camel from
Gus Patterson of Tennessee.
As a condition of the $500 sale, the Shriners
had to agree to name the camel after you-know-who. The rest is history,
Hermsen said.
"Gus is well-known in Florida, Alabama and
Georgia," Hermsen said. "He's requested for birthdays,
anniversaries and bar mitzvahs,"
Between public appearances, Gus resides in
Tanner's fenced yard. There, he ate his fill of No. 12 horse pellets and
provided companionship for his widowed landlady
"She would sit on the porch, which she did
daily, and look out and watch Gus," Stephenson said. "She was
his momma. He was just a big pet and a big baby."
Tanner died Thursday, and the Shriners decided
Gus should pay his last respects. On Sunday night, they called to let
the Tanner family know the camel was coming to the cemetery.
The Tanners approved.
After the service, Gus returned to the
fenced-in-yard, where the Tanner family said he will spend the rest of
his days eating horse pellets and bananas.
"This is his home," Stephenson said
"Forever" |
