epper Mill

aron Von Lodge was the head of a small country known as Lilliland near Switzerland. The time was the early 1900s.

One summer while the Baron and his fiancée Lady Angela of Alpine Castle were traveling in Germany and France, they came across a charming restaurant. What attracted the attention of the Baron and Lady Angela was that each table in the restaurant had a pepper mill of unusual design. They resembled the nutcracker except that they were for grinding pepper.

When the restaurant owner was asked about the pepper mills he said that wood carvers had carved the pepper mills during the winter season and sold them to tourists at the county fairs in the summertime.

The restaurant owner said that a nearby gift shop had a fine collection of the mills. The Baron and Lady Angela went to the gift shop and purchased a dozen differently carved pepper mills as gifts for relatives.

On the way back to Lilliland the Baron thought that it might be a nice idea to have the pepper mills on display in the town center and invite local artisans to submit their own designs for pepper mills in a local contest. The Baron asked Lady Angela to be one of the judges along with Professor Hamblin, the Baron’s chief advisor.

The pepper mill contest was scheduled with over a hundred entrants. The rules were that each mill be operational and were to be no larger than one foot tall.

The Baron took the longest time in selecting an appropriate first prize. He thought for days as to what to give and finally decided that it would be appropriate to offer a sum of money.

Lady Angela said that it would be too difficult to select one winner out a 100 participants. She asked the Baron to give ten prizes for the top ten winners. The Baron thought that was a good idea.

The contest drew crowds of citizens and tourists and everyone enjoyed themselves. The pepper mills were equally as good as the ones the Baron and Lady Angela had brought back from their trip.

The Baron turned to Lady Angela and Professor Hamblin several days after the contest and told them how amazed and pleased he was with the scope of the talent of his people in Lilliland.