# The Tacky History of the Pink Flamingo



## Meanderer

Have you ever owned a pair of these birds? ....WHY?

First designed in 1957, the fake birds are natives not of Florida but of Leominster, Massachusetts, which bills itself as the Plastics Capital of the World. At a nearby art school, sculptor Don Featherstone was hired by the plastics company Union Products, where his second assignment was to sculpt a pink flamingo. No live models presented themselves, so he unearthed a National Geographic photo spread. It took about two weeks to model both halves of the bird, brought into the third dimension by then-revolutionary injection-mold technology.


A flamingo-friendly trend was the sameness of post-World War II construction. Units in new subdivisions sometimes looked virtually identical. “You had to mark your house somehow,” Featherstone says. “A woman could pick up a flamingo at the store and come home with a piece of tropical elegance under her arm to change her humdrum house.” Also, “people just thought it was pretty,” adds Featherstone’s wife, Nancy.


That soon changed. Twenty-somethings of the Woodstock era romanticized nature and scorned plastics (à la The Graduate). Cast in flaming pink polyethylene, the flamingo became an emblem of what Nancy delicately calls the “T-word”—tackiness. Sears eventually dropped the tchotchkes from its catalog.


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## Falcon

I think they're even illegal in my tract.   HORRORS !!!


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## SifuPhil

Hey, I *like* them! They're neat looking! And they're useful! You can ... um ... they can ... errrr ... 

Well, _I_ like 'em! 

When I move to Florida, even before I find a place to live, I plan on buying several of them.


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## Warrigal

Flamingos? We haz swans made from old tyres


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## Twixie

My father owned something very similar looking..they were plastic herons..and were supposed to keep real herons from eating his goldfish...


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## Meanderer

Dame Warrigal said:


> Flamingos? We haz swans made from old tyres



Very cute War...but watch out for the alligators!   (only they were made from old tires.)


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## Meanderer

*[SIZE=+2][/SIZE]*[SIZE=+2]So tacky, yet so cool.[/SIZE]*[SIZE=+2]
http://uselessinformation.org/pink_flamingo/index.html

[/SIZE]*"The pink flamingo is one of those objects that people seem to either love or hate.   Considered by some to be a work of art and to others to be visual pollution, this one object stands for everything that is good and bad about our modern society.
Lawn ornaments are nothing new.  From marble statues created centuries ago to the Granny Fannies of the late 1980’s, lawn decorations have been around for an eternity.  Some compare a lawn without any ornaments to be like a coffee table that is totally empty.  (I can't comment here.  My coffee table was empty for years.  Now it is covered with junk.)
The history of the pink flamingo can be traced back to 1946 when a company called Union Products started manufacturing “Plastics for the Lawn”.  Their collection included dogs, ducks, frogs, and even a flamingo.  But their products had one problem: They were only two-dimensional.
Hmmm…  World peace surely depended on solving this critical problem".
*






*


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## Meanderer

Twixie said:


> My father owned something very similar looking..they were plastic herons..and were supposed to keep real herons from eating his goldfish...


Like these?


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## RadishRose

Those tire-alligators are awesome!


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## Falcon

And, So are the herons.


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## Meanderer




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## Meanderer




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## jujube

I used to dress mine up for the holidays.   Easter bunny ears, Santa Claus hats, witch's hats, etc.   They finally disintegrated because of the sun and I haven't replaced them yet.  Yep, I'm tacky and proud of it.


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## Pappy

Sure. First thing I did when we came tomFlorida, in '99, was buy a pair of pinkies. They also disintegrated after a few years.


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## Cookie

We had this tray when I was a kid, I think my mother won a set in a bingo game.


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## Meanderer




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## AZ Jim

Here you can only display pink flamingos if you live in a ratty old trailer, with old cars on the yard, and have a brother named BillyBob (who is also married to his sister) and fish with explosives.  J/k no attacks please.


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## Meanderer

Where life is deep-fried, and single-wide".


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## Cookie

[url]http://mentalfloss.com/article/28099/queen-kitsch-brief-history-plastic-pink-flamingo


[/URL]


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## Falcon

*GREAT*  music Jim.  Thanks.


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## Meanderer

*Flamingos Fly to Siberia: Evidence of a Magnetic Pole Reversal*


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## Mrs. Robinson

Nobody mentioned the tackiest Pink Flamingo of all....the movie....


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## Meanderer

Meanwhile....back at the raunch!


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## QuickSilver

Let's not forget the goofy Porch Goose..  Remember that fad?


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## Cookie

Arghh!  QS, Not in Canada. LOL  But I've seen these little fellas around.


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## Kathy G in MI

Love flamingos!
Hey, I've got a porch goose!!!


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## SeaBreeze




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## RadishRose

SeaBreeze said:


>



My first time ever seeing a baby flamingo. So cute, thanks SB!


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## SeaBreeze




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## Pappy




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## RadishRose

Oh, I love this video! I couldn't help but notice their quick head turns, side to side like some Flamenco dancers do! 

(Flamenco is Spanish for flamingo)


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## Aunt Bea




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## Aunt Bea




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## RadishRose

Imagine this bathroom


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## jujube

Many years ago, I was a Busch Gardens admiring the flamingo enclosure, when I noticed one flamingo repeatedly tapping her beak against a downspout on one of the buildings.  

A ranger was standing there and I asked him what the flamingo was doing.  He said that for the third year in a row, that one thought that the downspout was her baby and she was trying to get it to eat.  Apparently, mama 'mingos tap their babies with their beaks to stimulate them to eat.  He said she seemed to be happy so they didn't interfere.  

Question:  Why do flamingos stand on one foot?

Answer:  Because if they pulled up the other one, they'd fall down. 

Badda-boom.....


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## RadishRose




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## Meanderer




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## RadishRose




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## RadishRose




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## jujube

OK, I gave in and bought two plastic flamingos.  They're sticking in the grass in front of our RV.   Now, I can just say, "Go to the bottom of the hill, turn right and look for the flamingos."


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## Tommy

Sadly, ours were thrown out prior to our last move.  A little tacky "lawn art" helps to keep one from becoming too full of one's self.


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## Meanderer

Hipsters now flocking to once-tacky flamingos


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## fmdog44

Wasn't Bugsy Segal's first Vegas club called The Flamingo?


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## Meanderer

London mods outside of the Flamingo Club, 1964.


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## Meanderer

fmdog44 said:


> Wasn't Bugsy Segal's first Vegas club called The Flamingo?


Flamingo Hotel


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## Lc jones

I love my pink flamingos I have four floating in my pool and two in my planters in the backyard!


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## Lc jones

Oh I also have  A sculpture of  one in my living room They’re just so whimsical


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## Meanderer

Lc jones said:


> Oh I also have  A sculpture of  one in my living room They’re just so whimsical


How about a picture?


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## treeguy64

When I drive south to a tree gig, this is what I see on my way home:


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## Marie5656




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## Meanderer




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## 911

Meanderer said:


> Very cute War...but watch out for the alligators!  (only they were made from old tires.)



We have all seen the large pieces of rubber lying around on the interstates and turnpikes that are remnants of tires off of trucks that have blown that were mostly retreaded tires. Truckers call these pieces of large rubber, "Road Gators." 

The first time that I encountered this term was when I was a rookie Trooper patrolling the Pennsylvania Turnpike when I came upon a semi off to the side with his 4-ways blinking. I stopped to see if I could help. He told me that he ran over a "road gator" and it flew up into his engine compartment and must have struck something because the "Check Engine Soon" light came on. (That large piece of rubber actually tore one of the fan belts.)

I was like, "What's a "road gator?" He had his laugh for the day before telling me what it was. I made the mistake of telling just a few Troopers back at the barracks the story and it got around to the rest of the guys and of course, I was continually asked for about a week if I was bitten by any "road gators" today?


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## Meanderer

*Pink Bird



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## Meanderer




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## RadishRose




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## RadishRose




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## Meanderer

Happy Thanksgiving!


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## Lc jones

Meanderer said:


> Happy Thanksgiving!


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## RadishRose




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## Lc jones

RadishRose said:


>


He looks so disgusted, LOL!


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## treeguy64

Austin has a way of taking things to the extreme:


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## gennie

I much prefer the real ibis, herons, cranes and egrets that live in my neighborhood.  I've not seen a pink flamingo among the crowd but would not be surprised if one wandered in.


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## Keesha




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## Meanderer

Red sky in the morning, flamingos take warning!


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## Ken N Tx




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## RadishRose




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## jujube

My plastic ones are out in my front yard, wearing tiny surgical masks. They're the hit of the neighborhood.


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## RadishRose

jujube said:


> My plastic ones are out in my front yard, wearing tiny surgical masks. They're the hit of the neighborhood.


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## Meanderer

Courtesy of @Lara


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## fuzzybuddy

I had just bought my home. At work, another employee and I were joking about getting those tacky plastic flamingoes for my lawn. We were laughing our........off, when Karen walked in. All she heard was "pink flamingoes", she said she loved them. And she went on about them. But she got the idea I wanted a pair, so she kept on buying them for me. I didn't want to hurt her feelings, and she was  such a nice person, but I was getting a flock of those things. I tried giving them to Good Will, but they wouldn't take them. The trash guy was under contract, he had to.


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## RadishRose




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