Indiana for Dummies

Not to kick any town when they're down (wow, what a Dr. Seussian moment that was), but when you live in a state that too often ends up as a punch line for jokes about hicks and in-beeding Southern Baptists, well ... we're willing to chortle smugly and sit back with a there-but-for-the-grace-of-God-goes-I grin on our mug.

And so: Gloat time. Men's Health magazine has bestowed Fort Wayne, Indiana, with the dubious distinction of being the dumbest city in the United States.

According to USA Today, the magazine's survey has been the talk of the town -- provided Fort Wayne residents can talk.

"I always thought we were the fattest, not the dumbest," says Angela Jurczak, 26, a junior at IPFW (Indiana University-Purdue University at Fort Wayne).

"The elementary education major says it's hard to believe her hometown came in dead last in the smarts department. 'I would have guessed we're at least a C. Not an F. That's kind of sad.'
Sad, yes, but many residents also say it's dead wrong and question how the magazine came up with its findings.

"'In each case, we try to gather enough statistics from good sources to get what we think is an accurate snapshot,' says Matt Marion, who oversees the monthly 'MetroGrades' page for Men's Health. 'We feel pretty confident.'

"Dan O'Connell of the Fort Wayne/Allen County Convention and Visitors Bureau concedes that Fort Wayne is 'sort of a vanilla city' but says he was 'floored' by the study.'"

Hmm. When the municipal agency charged with boosting the town concedes it's "sort of vanilla," maybe we're not talking about the sharpest tools in the shed. In the long run, we actually suspect that "the dumbest city in America" is bound to be a bigger tourist draw than "sort of vanilla."