No, in spite of appearances, that really wasn't a 27 foot long 7 ton hot dog and bun parked in the Jim Thorpe Market's parking lot Wednesday afternoon.

It was the one and only Oscar Mayer Wienermobile, an advertising icon and to many baby boomers, something right out of their childhood memories.While it may be one-of-a-kind in concept and design, there are actually six Wienermobiles cruising the highways and byways of America today.The vehicle at the Jim Thorpe Market travels specifically in the Northeast region of the country, covering from Maine to Virginia and west to Ohio.Each vehicle is staffed by two "hotdoggers" which is what all of the Wienermobile drivers are called and each of them have their own personal hotdogger names.The drivers visiting Jim Thorpe yesterday were Brian Mallioux, who has the name "Brian the Bunderful" and Tera Geishauser, who has the name "Tera Louise with Cheese".The hotdoggers are recruited either at college campuses or through on-line applications and as with any other job, they then do job interwiews.Its a one year job running from June of one year to the following June and currently there are about 350 hotdogger alumni.Its a great way to see the nation. Hotdogger Tera will have visited 29 states by the end of the year having spent half a year in two different regions of the country.In addition to having the chance to climb into and check out the Wienermobile, there was the Wienerdot game for kids and the hotdoggers also gave out stickers, coloring sheets, postcards, and "the famous" Wiener whistles.The Weinermobiles and hotdoggers are headquartered out of Madison, Wisconsin.The first Oscar Mayer Wienermobile was built in 1936 with the oldest surviving model being from 1952 which is now in the Henry Ford Museum because earlier models had been scrapped during World War II for war metal.What exactly brought it to Jim Thorpe was an internet contest in which for the Wienermobile's 75th anniversary, they had a contest on Facebook where people could nominate their hometowns for a visit by the Wienermobile and there was a dedicated person from Jim Thorpe who voted every day and earned the visit yesterday.Anyone wanting to learn more about the Oscar Mayer Wienermobile and its long history can visit their website at

www.hotdoggerblog.com