It's Official - Six More Weeks of Winter

It's official - we have six more weeks until spring starts. Miss G, Massachusetts' very own prognosticating groundhog, saw her shadow this morning, letting us know that we have more winter weather coming. (Of course, skeptics point out that spring always starts around March 20, which is always six weeks from Groundhog Day). National celebrity groundhog Punxsutawney Phil also made the same prediction from his home in Pennsylvania.

Clifton Johnson recorded folklore about weather predicting groundhogs in Western Massachusetts way back in the 1890s. It's generally believed that Groundhog Day originated with German settlers in Pennsylvania, so I wonder if the local Yankees picked up the tradition from newspapers and magazines.