Molar expedition: The giant tooth of Trenton, New Jersey

Just down the road from the tooth are some fantastic sculptures of Mariachi musicians and dancers. That's an average-sized dope posing in front for a sense of scale.

In Trenton, New Jersey, just a stone's throw from the really big American Gothic statue we blogged about recently, sits another of sculptor-of-kooky-and-really-huge-subject-matter-extraordinaire Seward Johnson's kitschy roadside marvels: the world's largest tooth. Measuring in at around 15 feet tall, it sits gleaming in front of the Congoleum Company building and near the on-ramp to I-295 South, with nary a trace of tartar on it. And like he did with the American Gothic, Johnson has added a sculpture of a bemused, normal-sized couple gawking nearby, to give passersby a sense of the ridiculous scale of the tremendous tusk. How great it must be to be Seward Johnson, heir to the Johnson & Johnson pharmaceutical fortune, to have the wealth and talent to dot the landscape with all your crazy creations. Just down the street is his group of enormous Mariachi musicians and dancers. Why? You need a reason? Art doesn't have to say something all the time and hurt your head. Sometimes it's nice to give bored motorists a laugh and a smile. And that's the tooth.

But wait, there's more bad puns: To Mr. Johnson, we'd like to say fangs for the memories, we're abscessed with your work, there ought to be a plaque in your honor, do you work on retainer?, we're all up in your grill, we'll be your en-dentured servants, you're like a bridge over troubled water, we've grown bicuspid to your face and we're at a floss for words, dad gummit.

Where the world's largest buffalo roams: Scenes from Jamestown, North Dakota

 They've got the world's largest buffalo in Jamestown, North Dakota...

 ...next to a field of real buffalo...

 ...and this nice faux/real buffalo three-fer.

 They had a great gift shop in Jamestown when we were there in 2006. Loved these painted saw blades...

 ...and who wouldn't want a commemorative buffalo toilet seat?

Of all the painted boards with holes in them that I've stuck my face through, I like this one the most.

North Dakota is the land of eccentric roadside attractions. About 100 miles from Salem, home of Salem Sue, the world's largest Holstein cow, sits the town of Jamestown and the world's largest concrete buffalo. Unlike Sue, this fellow is nameless. I suppose if Clint Eastwood's character didn't need a name in "The Good The Bad and The Ugly," this guy doesn't need one either. He stands 26 feet tall, 46 feet long and weighs 60 tons. According to the town's website, he was built in 1959 and was the vision of Harold Newman, a local business owner. Eventually a little frontier village was added to attract tourists and now Jamestown boasts 100,000 visitors a year. It just goes to show you that if you build the world's biggest something or another, they will come. The buffalo stands majestically, waiting for tourists to be photographed next to him to impress the folks back home. But wait... there's more! They've got a buffalo museum with real buffalo grazing next to it and a gift shop with just about anything you could want with a buffalo on it. My favorite was the toilet seat. And the skies are not cloudy all day. Read more about Jamestown here: http://www.jamestownnd.com/

Cart blanche: Johnston, Rhode Island's 12-foot hand cart

Those are real automobile tires, you know.

I couldn't get a picture of a person in front of the cart, so I've photoshopped two 5-foot-six Ringo Starrs in correct proportion to the 12-foot cart.

There's nothing we love along the open road more than an over-sized object to get your attention, and there's a great, big one in the humble New England berg of Johnston, Rhode Island. The Yankee Supply Company, who make used industrial warehousing equipment their specialty, has a 12-foot tall, gleaming red hand cart in front of their headquarters on busy Route 6, near exit 6 off I-295. It's so big, in fact, the wheels are actual Continental brand automobile tires. The Yankee workers refer to it as the "Paul Bunyan hand truck" and it occasionally leaves its perch to travel (by large truck one assumes) to trade shows (thanks quahog.org).

We live for moments like this, when ordinary objects become roadside giants, so hats off to you, Yankee Supply. Baby you can drive our cart, beep beep, mm, beep beep, yeah!

I'll take that as a condiment: The World's Largest Catsup Bottle of Collinsville, Illinois

Collinsville is a cute little town...

...and they've got another nice, albeit more traditional, water tower.

They know how to put on a nice sunset, too.

We're big fans of water towers here at Eccentric Roadside and there's a Grade A Fancy one in the pleasant St. Louis suburb of Collinsville, Illinois. In 1949, the bottlers of Brooks Old Original Rich and Tangy Catsup commissioned the W.E. Caldwell Company to build a 100,000-gallon water tower next to their Collinsville plant. Not ones to miss a marketing opportunity, they designed their tower to closely resemble their slender, tapered catsup bottle, making it a giant condiment in the sky. The Brooks brand had great success and in 1959 the company merged with another. Bottling operations were moved to Indiana but the bottle tower remained in Collinsville. By 1993, the current owners wanted to sell the property and the bottle's future looked doomed. This is when a group of Collinsville's bottle-lovers formed the Catsup Bottle Preservation Group. The catsup company agreed to deed the tower to the town of Collinsville, but the town balked at the cost of painting and maintaining the tower, so the preservation group began a two-year fund raising drive (complete with a visit by the Oscar Meyer Wienermobile) that resulted in the eventual designation of the tower on the National Register of Historic Places. They've had a yearly catsup festival for the last 13 years, complete with a hot dog eating contest, musical chairs, a please pass the catsup tournament, and the crowning of Little Princess Tomato and Little Sir Catsup. Next year's event is scheduled for July 8, so mark your calendars.

You mayo may not realize it but it's great to see how, when in a pickle, a local group can mustard the strength to overcome adversity and relish their victory, if you catsup my drift.

The County Seat: The World's Largest Rocking Chair of Amity, Indiana

We took a pleasant detour off the Interstate between Indianapolis and Louisville into the pretty little community of Franklin, Indiana. Just south of there is the even smaller village of Amity and, although it's a dinky town, they do have a very big thing to offer. Two big things in fact. Long's Furniture World is home to Big John, the world's largest rocking chair. They also have a very large chest of drawers that serves as their front entrance. Let's see... a big chest and a big seat. I know there's a crude master-of-ceremonies-at-a-bachelor-party joke in there somewhere. As is often the case with declaring your whatever-it-is the "world's largest," this example is not without controversy. Fanning U.S. 66 Outpost & General Store in the Route 66 town of Fanning, Mo., installed a 42-foot-tall rocking chair in 2008. This surpasses Big John by probably 10 feet (I can't seem to find any Big John stats online). But we won't quibble...Big John is the largest chair we've ever seen, and it's especially stark against the flat Indiana farm landscape. We love places like this that get you miles off the highway to see the real America in all its eccentric banality and splendor. Keep on rockin' in the free world, Amity!