Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette "Cowboy Sam" towers over the Cadet Restaurant on Route 422 in Kittanning. Click on the photo for larger image from a different angle.

How can you find Kittanning's Cadet Restaurant?

The question is: How can you miss it? What with the 30-foot-tall cowboy standing out front on Route 422 wearing what looks to be a 10,000-gallon hat and holding a hamburger that looks like a quarter-tonner.

Customers "go by the cowboy," says owner George Morda. "They like that."

Mr. Morda, who started the business in 1952, met this big boy at the 1962 Chicago restaurant show and decided to buy him for $3,900.

As the fiberglass statue helped rope in diners, it acquired the nickname "Cowboy Sam" from Sam the police officer, who patrolled the popular drive-in lot the restaurant ran at the time.

Alas, one foggy morning in, Mr. Morda believes, 1978, the big man in white was felled by a Ford Bronco that was smashed into it by a loaded coal truck coming from Indiana, Pa. Sam's broken body lay behind the restaurant, the subject of some pranks by local students who'd "borrow" his hat or his whole head.

But some Cadet customers eventually pieced Sam together again, and they finally stood him back up by crane in 2002. The traveling public, who still tend to stop and snap pictures and buy 50-cent postcards, couldn't have been happier. Nor could Mr. Morda, who says, Sam "helped me out tremendously in my business," increasing it by 20-some percent.

"That's what he's there for."

Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette Above is the oversized hamburger outside of Max & Erma's downtown restaurant. Click here to see the extra large Dip Cone at Kennywood Park. Click photo for larger image.

Cowboy Sam is a big part, but just one big part, of a new book, "Roadside Giants," published by Stackpole Books. The little $14.95 paperback is a labor of love by local history buff Brian Butko and his wife, Sarah.

Mr. Butko, a lifelong West Mifflin resident, works as editor of the Historical Society of Western Pennsylvania's Western Pennsylvania History magazine. His previous book, which came out earlier this year, was "Greetings From the Lincoln Highway: America's First Coast-to-Coast Road," his second about that great route. He's also written about diners and Isaly's, which gives you the flavor of his tastes.

Mrs. Butko is a data conversion operator for the U.S. Postal Service, a PTA president and a Girl Scout leader. The couple have three children, who've gone on lots of road trips with them and even helped find a few elusive giants.

As Dad quips, "We now specialize in U-turns."

	Darrell Sapp, Post-Gazette The world's largest teapot resides in Chester, W.Va. The teapot was started as a wooden barrel for a promotion for Hire's Root Beer. Click photo for larger image.

The Butkos covered a lot of highways and byways for this fits-in-the-glovebox guide, which spotlights two-dozen larger-than-life roadside attractions and lists dozens of others with directions for finding them. There are more comprehensive sources, but the couple wanted to make this vast subject interesting and accessible to a broader audience.

As they write in their introduction, "Looming over the Landscape," giants are popular props in movies and TV commercials and have intense fringe fans, but, "It's still often difficult for the public, let alone some historians and civic planners, to recognize such attractions as historic, attractive and a boon to their local economy."

	Meet the people behind 'Roadside Giants' Sarah and Brian Butko will talk about and sign "Roadside Giants" from noon to 1 p.m. Nov. 19, at the Barnes & Noble store at the Waterfront in Homestead (412-462-5743). Mr. Butko also will be talking about a subject of another of his books, Isaly's, at two upcoming events: 7 p.m. Nov. 17 at the Carnegie Library of McKeesport (412-672-0625). 6:30 p.m. Nov. 21 at the Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh's Brookline branch (412-561-1003). Also, from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. Dec. 3, the Butkos will be among the 20 authors at the annual book fair at the Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center in the Strip District (412-454-6411).

As they recount, giants grew out of America's car culture in the 1920s, when entrepreneurs upped the ante from big signs to entire buildings that looked like the products they were selling, be it doughnuts or ice cream cones. Others erected massive statues, from dinosaurs to Amish folk, to catch the eyes and dollars of tourists and others.

Mr. Butko says one of his favorite finds is the hot-dog-in-a-bun-shaped Coney Island restaurant near Denver. "I don't know why. It's silly, but silly in a fun way. And it was neat that everyone there just took it for granted. We were probably the only oddballs racing around with a camera."

The book depicts examples of the various types of giants from coast to coast, but some should be familiar to local readers. One is the Coffee Pot (capital letters just seem necessary) in Bedford. Another is the Teapot in Chester, W.Va., which the couple passed on their second date.

The Butkos note other interesting sights in this region, including colossal doughnuts in Beaver County, a stocky Santa statue in Indiana, a buncha bull in Mercer, and Downtown's bulky burger at Max & Erma's.

Kittanning's Cowboy Sam is of the genre called "Muffler Men," as these human forms often held mufflers in their hands and stood in front of auto-related businesses. But the California company that crafted them (after starting with one ax-wielding Paul Bunyan) offered options such as the burger, and creative owners added their own custom touches over the decades.

A once-bearded Muffler Man also pictured in the book, standing at now-closed tire store on Route 119 in Greensburg, is painted over to look like beardless Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Tommy Maddox, complete with a face mask.

The Butkos (who also plan to do a bigger book on roadside attractions) conclude that while many giants have been lost, others are being preserved, and a few continue to be built, such as the wacky basket-shaped headquarters of the Longaberger basket company in Newark, Ohio (Mrs. Butko's favorite).

They allow that this isn't necessarily fine art, but it's clear they're among those who like it.

"A roadside giant is likely the only reason you've ever heard of some small towns or businesses," they write. "They continue to sell and entertain."

Courtesy of book "Roadside Giants." The basket-shaped headquarters of the Longaberger Home Office is on Main Street in Newark, Ohio.