Hartford Athletic might not be having a fairytale season, but one of the newest additions to the club is straight out of a storybook.
“I think it’s more of a ‘once upon a time’ type story,” said Hartford Athletic senior vice president of marketing and communications, John Ponziani.
Once upon a time, Hartford Athletic set out to find a new mascot.
“We really wanted to find something that was truly, uniquely Connecticut,” said Ponziani. “We obviously have always had the colors green and blue. … There's no animal that's really green and blue right?”
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So, they searched high and low to every corner of the state.
The answer, it turns out, was just down the road from Trinity Health Stadium in Hartford.
“He's about -- let’s call him 6-foot-2. He's got soccer ball antennas,” Ponziani said, describing their mascot, Dillon, which was unveiled earlier this year. “Dillon is a big, green and blue fluffy Glawackus.”
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A Gla-wack-what?
“It's not really clear what this thing is or what it does,” said Ponziani.
No, that story, that one starts differently.
“Oh, it was a dark and stormy night,” said Robert Laughlin, executive director of the Glastonbury Historical Society.
It's 1939 in Glastonbury. Small dogs, cats and farm animals were being attacked.
“There were some people who said they saw something like a large cat or dog,” said Laughlin. “And then it started becoming something otherworldly. … I think at one point there were combinations of panther, bear, dog, cat.”
A tale like that doesn’t stay in one small town.
“There were hunters who actually came from New York City, said Laughlin. “They were going to go out and find this beast and they didn't have any luck either.”
It wasn't long before that beast got its name -- courtesy of a “Hartford Courant” reporter, Francis King.
“Gla-wack-us, Glastonbury-wacky-us,” said Laughlin.
What followed was wacky. There were articles and advertisements, even an imposter.
“This gentleman in Glastonbury, James Williams, crafted these footprints are basically something he would tie on his feet,” Laughlin said while he showed us a replica of “Glawackus” footprints. “And he apparently was going around making footprints all through the snow, playing a practical joke on his friends.”
That’s as close as anyone got to finding the Glawackus then.
“Nobody ever caught it,” said Laughlin. “We don't have any photos of it. It's very much like Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster.”
Though, they do know where to find one now.
“You know the character's origin story is that Glawackus’ have this particular reputation,” said Ponziani. “He's different from everything that was predetermined about the Glawackus. … He tried to find his people and ultimately landed here, which is right where he wanted to be.”
