Mr. Potato Head Gets Sacked in the `Birthplace of Fun'

0 Comments | Insight on the News, Dec 25, 2000 | by John Elvin

A tip of the hat to the reader who alerted washington in brief to the Mr. Potato Head controversy. Seems that Rhode Island, a state billing itself as the "Birthplace of Fun," is populated with large statues of the popular Mr. Potato Head toy figure produced in Pawtucket by Hasbro Inc. There are dozens of the statues, each individually designed by local artists. The number has dwindled, though, due to vandalism and complaints.

It's part of a state tourism promotion. And the promoters weren't real happy when one of their potato statues, a 6-foot-tall character in a Hawaiian shirt and shades, was accused of looking like Little Black Sambo, a Victorian-era fictional character now deemed offensive on racial grounds. The complaint came from Onna Moniz-John, an affirmative-action officer. She said the tanned, grinning, potato statue looked like Sambo because its clothes fit too tightly and because of its dark coloring. "If you look at this Potato Head," opined Moniz-John, "the only thing missing is a watermelon."

"He's a potato, that's why he's brown," said artist Kathy Szarko, creator of the controversial figure. She volunteered to paint the thing any color officials specified, but they removed the statue anyway.

The Mr. Potato Head sculptures that have survived scrutiny by the PC police are taking a beating nonetheless. Some have been smashed by culprits who, for some curious reason, hurl themselves repeatedly at the statues until they have done damage. One was stolen from a site in downtown Providence and turned up on the campus of Brown University. It weighed 136 lbs. Others have had arms or noses broken off. "Why anyone would want to harm Mr. Potato Head is beyond me," Becky Bovell, a state travel official, told a correspondent for APB online news service.