Harry R. Schwartz

Since 1966, the town of Gävle in northern Sweden has yearly built a giant straw goat to celebrate Christmas. And arsonists almost yearly set the goat on fire.

The vandals and policemen engage in an annual struggle to decide whether the goat will live or die, and the vandals usually seem to win out. Here’s a timeline mentioning some of the more entertaining incidents in the goat’s history:

1966

Stig Gavlén came up with the idea of a giant goat made out of straw. The goat stood until 12:00 p.m. that New Year’s Eve, when it went up in flames.

1968

The goat survived. Until this year there was no fence around the goat and it was popular for children to play hide-and-seek inside and around the goat. Also, it is said that one night a couple made love inside the goat. As a result, in subsequent years the inside of the goat has been protected by a chicken-wire net.

1970

The goat burned down only six hours after it was assembled.

1971

Tired of arson, the project is abandoned. Schoolchildren build a miniature. Their little goat was kicked to pieces.

1972

The goat collapsed because of sabotage.

1976

A car crashes into the goat.

1979

The goat was burnt even before it was erected. A new one was built and fireproofed. It was destroyed and broken into pieces.

1988

Nothing happened to the goat this year, but gamblers were for the first time able to gamble on the fate of the goat with English bookmakers.

2006

The Southern Merchants’ goat survived New Year’s Eve and was taken down on 2 January. It is now stored in a secret location.

— Mixed together and edited with material from Wikipedia and the BBC.

And, yes, the 2008 goat was also burned.