Today in 1959, a write-in candidate for city council in São Paulo, Brazil, won a huge victory, fueled by a public that was fed up with the status quo and wanted some big changes.
There was only one catch: the candidate that won that victory was a rhinoceros from the São Paulo Zoo.
The election had over 500 human candidates running for 45 seats on the council.
But voters were apparently not too thrilled with them, or with the direction of the city.
A Life Magazine article from the time says prices were on the rise, there were food shortages and city sewers were in bad shape.
Somebody said, why not stage a protest vote around a rhino that’s been on loan from the zoo in Rio de Janeiro?
Never mind that it was only four years old at the time.
Or that its name, Cacareco, meant “rubbish” in Portuguese.
Or that the Rio zoo’s director called her an “ugly beast” and that “[y]ou could put her brain in a Brazil nut.”
She got over 100,000 write-in votes; the top human candidate got just over 10,000.
Cacareco was of course disqualified from serving on the council on account of being a rhino, and the city had to hold another election.
Still, if voters would rather have a rhino on the city council than you… they’ve definitely made a point.
Today in 1935 was an unusual day for Byron Fugate of Houston, Missouri.
According to the Bend, Oregon Bulletin, his wife had just bought him a hat at a secondhand sale, but when he looked at it closely, it had his initials on it.
That’s because it was his hat; he’d lost it three years earlier at college.
Rhino Horns In On A Brazilian Election (Life Magazine)
Hat Lost 3 Years Returns (Bend Bulletin)
