Raccoon whose sidewalk death went viral immortalized with Heritage Toronto plaque
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Ten years ago, a dead raccoon on a downtown street sparked an impromptu sidewalk shrine as passersby laid flowers, candles and cigarettes around the critter.
Now, Conrad the raccoon has been immortalized in the city’s history with a heritage plaque at the spot where it all happened.
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Conrad went viral in 2015 after his remains laid on the sidewalk at the corner of Yonge and Church Sts. for nearly 14 hours following a social media post reporting the dead animal to the city.
Meg Sutton, plaques co-ordinator with Heritage Toronto, says the 10th anniversary of Conrad’s death is the perfect occasion to revive the raccoon’s story, which she says united Canadians across the country.
The plaque includes photos of the posts that launched the #DeadRaccoonTO hashtag, imprints of raccoon paws and a QR code that leads to a website where people can post their own raccoon stories.
As the first animal plaque in the city, Sutton says it also serves to highlight the natural history of raccoons in urban spaces.
In the early 1900s, industrialization and deforestation caused such a threat to the raccoon population that people worried the creatures would go extinct, she said.
“Now, raccoons have become so adaptable and resilient that they’ve made their homes in attics and sheds, they’ve found new diet sources and human-discarded food, and they’ve just become these cheeky personalities that run amok,” Sutton said Tuesday in an interview.
So far, more than 400 people have scanned the QR code on Conrad’s plaque and the webpage has been visited more than 1,000 times.
After a month, a permanent version of the plaque will be installed to replace the QR code with life-size raccoon prints since the QR code requires maintenance and upkeep, Sutton said.
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Promoting community engagement was the main goal of the plaque, she said, since “everyone has a raccoon story in Toronto.”
“Conrad is one for the people, where he represents a lot of individual moments or interactions,” Sutton said.
“And I think we all kind of fell in love with him.”
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