From the Cedar Rapids Gazette, Feb. 11, 1971

A little more info from a 1995 Gazette column:

Because you are as yet uninformed, six weeks ago was the 24th anniversary of the day Andy Griffith was named an honorary Cedar Rapidian.

Griffith, emotionally shaken by the honor that day, managed to say, ”I appreciate it.”

He smiled. We all smiled, including then-Mayor Don Canney.

“It was the anniversary of Mayberry or something,” Canney said recently. “The show’s promo people called me. I think they did it on the air. …A whole bunch of cities were named.”

Was there excitement in the streets of Cedar Rapids that day in 1971?

“Any publicity not negative,” says Canney, was good enough to pursue. …