CLAREMORE, Okla. — An alligator found at Claremore Lake and euthanized is bringing the community together with memorial tattoo’s, petitions and a mini festival to remember the alligator.
At the first ever Gator Days Festival at Claremore lake there is a band, sausage gator pizza, gator aid, memorial gator t-shirts and a giant balloon gator.
Jackson Savage is the man behind the Gator Days Festival.
“It’s an unusual thing to bring people together that’s for sure,” Savage told FOX23.
He’s even named the alligator.
“I call him Al or Albert Edwards Gator al e gator,” he explained.
Savage spread the word about the festival through a Facebook event. It has nearly 2,000 followers.
He hopes this festival will become an annual event by the lake for the alligator.
“I felt like we needed to at least remember it. What I would like to see would be a sign out up or a statue or something,” Savage said.
Meanwhile alligator mania has struck The Secret Ink Tattoo shop in Claremore. They’ve started doing memorial gator tattoos.
Tammy Wallace is the manager of The Secret Ink Tattoo shop.
“The phones are blowing up,” Wallace said. “We’ve got them coming in. They’re calling nonstop.”
She continued, “Everybody’s having fun with it.”
Wallace said the memorial tattoos started as a joke, but they’ve done around 50 tattoos already.
“They just love it. They say years from now, the grandkids will say ‘why do you have that gator?’ well let me tell you, 2022 was [the year] there was a gator found in the lake.”
The alligator fever has spread to Oolagha Lake too. Nine of the crew members from Red Bed Marina have gotten the tattoos.
“They started talking about the gator, and we were all here. So I thought we’d just pitch in,” said Brett Moorhead, one of the crew members.
The Claremore Museum of History even joined in on the fun. They made a joke post about the alligator.
There’s even a petition to change the name of the Claremore Football Team from the Zebras to the Gators.
Dillon Foudray is the man behind it.
“Everyone just kinda agrees with me Claremore gators is that not like the best sounding ring to it,” Foudray said.
Nearly 200 people have signed the petition so far. He said the alligator has definitely brought Claremore together.
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