Ducks at the Peabody

So picture a grand hotel, Waldorf-Astoria style, plush and ornate, in the middle of downtown Memphis. Outside the Peabody, wood and tile inlays have been set into the concrete, along with names and designs, like the ones in front of the Chinese theater in Hollywood. There are five inlays and each has a name: Four are Belz (the Belz Family owned the hotel for decades) and one is Presley.

The design on all the inlays is duck webs.

Walk through an arcade into the lobby, and there are more inlays on the polished floors: More ducks!



Pause at the glass display cases, inside of which are jade ducks and wood ducks and sculptured ducks and hand crafted duck decoys and jeweled ducks. Adjoining shops sell duck shirts and duck shoes (!) and duck aprons and duck bath towels and diamond earings shaped like ducks.

The Great Ducknik's ears and eyes have perked up and her heart is a-flutter.



In the center of the lobby is a fountain, bedecked with flowers. Outside the fountain is a small stepstool with two steps. Swimming in the fountain are three duck females and one mallard drake.



At 6PM, every day, rain or shine, the four ducks jump up onto the fountain edge, hop down the red-carpeted stairway and onto the marble tiles and Oriental carpet, form a single line with the drake in front, cross the lobby and waddle past well-dressed patrons smoking cigars, heading in front of the display cases towards the elevator. A keeper pushes a button and the ducks pad into the elevator. Presumably, one of them jumps up and presses Eleven.



At Floor Eleven, the ducks waddle out of the elevator onto the hotel roof, where they continue in a straight line to the Duck Palace, which is a little pool inside a structure which has been built for them. The keeper opens the wire enclosure door, and the ducks settle in for the night.




Tourists come stare at them in their pool in their palace, and then walk down to the bar and buy a cocktail or two to sit and talk about how the whole world is going quackers.

It couldn't be cooler. Yeah, there's Graceland and barbecue and Civil Rights, but come on! Ducks! Go, Memphis!