Daisy Mae is a cow for all seasons.
Surrounded by patriotic red, white and blue ornamentation, in August she will be clothed in a new back-to-school outfit.
For two decades, this fashion animal has been turning heads among motorists who pass her Greensburg home at the intersection of Hawksworth Drive and North Main Street.
Donna Dutchko, who owns that home, gives the concrete bovine statue a periodic costume change, continuing a tradition started by her aunt and uncle, Nancy and James Martz.
“Everybody knows the Greensburg cow,” Dutchko said, noting Daisy Mae has captured the fancy of many a fan. To show their appreciation, she said, “People have left cards and gifts. They’ve delivered cookies to the house.” Many of the letters and packages have simply been addressed to “the cow lady.”
Tethered to a lamppost, Daisy Mae literally is dressed up with no place to go.
She has appeared as a witch for Halloween, a Pittsburgh Steelers player during football season and a pilgrim at Thanksgiving. She’s sported a rain slicker and umbrella with the arrival of April showers, a flower-decked bonnet for Easter and a mortar board cap, tassel and black gown to mark Graduation Day at the local Greensburg Salem School District.
The neighborhood fixture’s story began when the Martz family was in the market for a lawn figurine and spotted the all-white cow statue on a trip to Somerset County.
“They didn’t want a deer statue like everybody else,” Dutchko said.
When Daisy Mae arrived in Greensburg, she was a 400-pound blank slate. Local artist and teacher Jerome D’Angelo applied the black markings that cemented her identity as a member of the familiar Holstein breed. Eventually, she gained a similarly colored calf, nicknamed “Tiny.”
Celebrated by many, Daisy Mae also has suffered her fair share of abuse. Her ears were damaged and had to be repaired when she was knocked over.
On another occasion, when someone stole the book bag she carried in her back-to-school guise, the crime made headlines in the Tribune-Review and on the CNN cable network.
Her defenders included one Margaret L. Walls, who was inspired to create a poem that she presented to the Martzes. Walls wrote that Daisy Mae “wouldn’t wish bad luck on anyone because she isn’t catty/But it would do her heart good if that thief would fall on his face in a fresh cow patty!”
After two decades exposed to the elements, Daisy Mae’s black-and-white coat could do with a touch-up.
But, echoing Walls’ sentiments, Dutchko said, “One thing is for certain. She is the best-dressed cow in town.”
