Jackrabbit at Jack Rabbit Trading Post being restored

No, that is not a ghost rabbit at the Jack Rabbit Trading Post near Joseph City, Arizona. It’s the famed fiberglass statue undergoing a makeover with a new undercoat before it’s repaired and repainted.

The big, saddled jackrabbit is “out of commission” to visitors until the end of this week while its owners restore it.

The owners said the 34-year-old jackrabbit, second only to the “Here It Is!” billboard as a photo-op at the Route 66 business, needs some TLC. Co-owner Cindy Jaquez stated in a text Wednesday:

He has some wear & tear thru the years. The side steps were just about gone so those had to be almost completely redone. […] A couple of friends from Winslow are coming over today & tomorrow to give him some fresh paint. It really needed to be done. So since we did the bad side of the famous HERE IT IS sign last year & the storefront this year, Mr. Rabbit needed to be done too. Just in time for our 70th-anniversary party.

She also said the top of the jackrabbit’s ears also are a bit scuffed and need to be repaired, as well. As to how the ears got scuffed is quite a story:

Back in 2002, the year after 9-11, Holbrook had their annual nighttime Christmas parade, & it was a red, white & blue themed parade. We decided to put in a float for this parade. We had a pretty cool float. We used red, white & blue lights & flocked a bunch of tumbleweeds & has some cardboard cacti. Mr. Rabbit was the final thing to be put onto the float. The day of the parade Tony put him up onto the back of our old blue Ford pickup & headed off to Holbrook. Well, he decided to take the backroads to town. Just outside Joseph City, he came to the old bridge that crossed the Little Colorado River. The bridge has clearance but Tony thought, “we got this!” NOT. Mr. Rabbit did not clear. His ears hit the top of the clearance & down into the river he rolled. Thank goodness he is fiberglass & hollow! Tony had to drag him back up the embankment & load him back onto Big Blue. He went back to Joseph City to catch I-40 to Holbrook. But it was a great parade & we won the small class award. […] Mr. Rabbit did have a few scuffs from that accident but not bad. So those are getting smoothed out.

James Taylor built the Jack Rabbit Trading Post along U.S. 66 in 1949. Glen Blansett bought the business in 1967 and passed it on to his son and daughter-in-law. They eventually sold it to their daughter and son-in-law, Cindy and Tony Jaquez.

(Images of the jackrabbit at Jack Rabbit Trading Post near Joseph City, Arizona, via Facebook)