Really? Montana’s Favorite ‘National Day’ is Surprising

Let's play a word association game— I'll give you a word and you think of everything that comes to mind. The word is: Montana.

Chances are you thought of national parks, wildlife and cowboy stuff. Just guessing here, but I doubt you thought of pasta, even though that's Montana's favorite "national day"  according to shaneco.com. The website determined favorites using Google Trends to find which national day each state searched for the most, and Montana was the only state that had national pasta day (which is today, October 17th, by the way) as their favorite.

According to the 2020 census, just 3.1% of Montanans are Italian. Not that you have to be Italian to enjoy pasta, it's just that I'd expect a state like Rhode Island, which has the highest percentage of Italians with 19%, would appreciate pasta more than a state like Montana.

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Montana's favorite holiday is a lot more on brand, Saint Patrick's day. Zippia.com used US census ancestry data and found that Montana is the 9th most Irish state and that roughly 14% of Montanans have an Irish background. Here's a few "national days" I would think Montana would enjoy more than national pasta day:

National Doughnut Day

We've got a lot more doughnut shops than we do Italian food restaurants, but Google Trends doesn't lie. The states that love national doughnut day the most are Hawaii and Maine, two states that are quite different. Go figure.

National Dog Day

It seems Montana loves pasta more than pooches. New Jersey, Virginia and Vermont are the states that searched for "national dog day" the most, so I guess they're big into dogs out east.

National Whiskey Day

Not a single state's favorite national day is whiskey day, which I think is a better fit for Montana. Anyway, who's got red sauce?