Florence Y'all water tower

A water tower that greets interstate drivers with a Southern contraction owes its slogan to a legal problem. The Florence Y'all tower stands in Florence, Kentucky, on the west side of the I-71/I-75 expressway, on a corner of property that developers offered the city for a million-gallon tank. According to Mayor Diane Whalen, speaking to Spectrum News in January 2022, the offer came with a stipulation that the tower would read "Florence Mall", advertising a shopping centre then under construction. Soon after, the city was told it was in violation. Whalen cited the highway beautification act, which prohibited billboards along interstates, and WCPO reported that the state Transportation Cabinet said Florence could not legally advertise a business that did not yet exist.

A full repaint was beyond the city's means, so Whalen's father, Mayor Hop Ewing, sketched variations on a napkin and settled on the cheapest: paint over the two legs of the M and add an apostrophe. WCPO reported that a local painter agreed to the job for $500 and that the mall opened in December. The plan to return to the original wording ended once the owners deeded the land to the city, so they could no longer advertise there, Spectrum News reported.