No Okra Queen?

The little town of Irmo, South Carolina, is proud of its okra the same way Gilroy, Calif., is of its garlic.

The Okra Strut, as the festival is known, has its roots in a radio dee-jay joke.

"It started in 1973, the punch line of a local radio personality who mused on-air about a hardware shop in town, the Ancient Irmese General Store. He wondered: Who were these so-called Irmese?

"Probably a short tribe of farmers who subsisted on okra, figured the DJ, Gene McKay, who died earlier this year. And that fall the festival was born, a quaint arts-and-crafts show, with plenty of okra to eat, staged in a park by a local women's club."

For the real okra-lovers out there, here is information about the Sept. 28-29 festival: http://www.irmookrastrut.com