PO Box 765, Rapid City SD 57709 BlackHillsCelticEvents.org Info@BlackHillsCelticEvents.org Volume 9 Issue 6 June 2007 Serving the Celtic Communities of: Wales, Isle of Man, Cornwall (England), Glacia (Spain), Brittany (France), Scotland and Ireland You may contribute news and photos by email to Info@BlackHillsCelticEvents.org The Knights are hosting the annual SIS’s Midsummer’s Eve gathering It’s a potluck, BYOB , bring a lawn chair or two for your added comfort and Celtic attire is strongly encouraged. Bring a Guest! Those of you who have attended past Midsummer’s gatherings know the fun that was had and as I have mentioned earlier Sally promises more of the same Celtic fun, frolic and mystique. See you all there!!  DIRECTIONS: Turn south off Jackson Blvd onto Sheridan Lake Rd., go about 6 miles, turn left onto Dunsmore Rd., take the first right onto Kerry Dr. to the 3rd house on the left (log house), or take Hwy 16 south to Moon Meadows Rd and turn right for approximately 3 miles to Dunsmore Rd. Turn left onto Dunsmore Rd and take the first road to the right which is Kerry Dr. and look for the 3rd house on the left. There will be signs posted as you near our house. Feel free to call us when and if you get lost at 343-2884 or 390-6276 (Sally submitted an extensive history of Midsummer’s Eve. See that article later in the newsletter.) June 16 6:00 p.m. Midsummer’s Eve Celebration @ Knights Jun 21 6:00 p.m. NO General membership Meeting in June because of the Midsummer’s Eve party INSTEAD! July 5 7:00 p.m. Board Meeting July 19 7:00 p.m. General membership Meeting, American Legion Post 22, Rapid City PROGRAM: Independence day and our Celtic heritage by Bill Knight Aug 2 7:00 p.m. Board Meeting Aug 16 7:00 p.m. General membership Meeting, American Legion Post 22, Rapid City PROGRAM: TBA Aug 30-Sept 2 Gathering of the Clans Celtic Festival at Memorial Park Sept 6 7:00 p.m. Board Meeting Sept 20 7:00 p.m. General membership Meeting, American Legion Post 22, Rapid City PROGRAM: TBA *American Legion Post 22, 818 East St. Patrick St, Rapid City There is good news for our Celtic community! Siaryn Duggan and her husband John have opened up a new Celtic shop in town, the Celtic Connection. It is located at 517th 6th street, it is co-located in the Bag Ladies Shop at the present time. So go on down, browse and say hello to Siaryn Duggan and support the new shop. Siaryn is adding new items daily. She’s got Celtic foods on order. More info on the shop as it develops. All’s Well in Celtic Land What could be better? Summer’s here, a time for family gatherings, graduations, vacations and hours of outdoor fun. A great BBQ was hosted by John and Siaryn Duggan of COA on Friday May 29th, which turned out to be a typical coolish South Dakota evening. Though the weather was not exactly summer like, the food and drink were terrific, which included some wonderful summertime pasta and salad dishes along with grilled brats (bangers if you prefer) and Matt Murraine’s infamous Guinness brisket. The best part of the evening though was the fellowship and friendship enjoyed by everyone who was there. We each had our ideas of what we could do to continue to enlighten our community about our Celtic Culture, to attract new members and to keep the interest of our current members. Basically it was quite simple; just keep on doing what we are doing. Are we not having fun? Have we not been able to help others in need? And who enjoys a gathering or a party more then a Celt? No one that I know of and best of all the word is getting out to the community about our culture and heritage. A party or a gathering doesn’t have to be big to be good; it just has to be good to be big…   Bill Knight President /SIS “Hello from Afghanistan! I thank you for sending me these e-mails; it is nice to hear what is going on at home!!!  I decided that I will come home for leave and have the time of the Black Hills Scottish/Irish festival for the scheduled time.  My mother still thinks I am going to Scotland (I want to keep it that way) but I couldn't miss the festival this year and seeing all of the friends I have made in the Scottish/Irish society.  I should also be home in time for the 2008 Burn's night and can't wait to see you there also.  Thank you again for all of your prayers and support.  My mailing address is: John Savery 235th MP CO APO, AE 09354 (Just in case anyone would like to keep in touch with letters instead of e-mail (john.savery@us.army.mil)).  Slancha va agus beanacht Dea, Sgt. John M. Savery    In the 16th and 17th centuries, everything had to be transported by ship and it was also before commercial fertilizer's invention, so large shipments of manure were common.  It was shipped dry, because in dry form it weighed a lot less than when wet, but once water (at sea) hit it, it not only became heavier, but the process of fermentation began again, of which a by product is methane gas. As the stuff was stored below decks in bundles you can see what could (and did) happen.  Methane began to build up below decks and the first time someone came below at night with a lantern, BOOOOM! Several ships were destroyed in this manner before it was determined just what was happening.   After that, the bundles of manure were always stamped with the term “Ship High In Transit" on them, which meant for the sailors to stow it high enough off the lower decks so that any water that came into the hold would not touch this volatile cargo and start the production of methane. Thus evolved the term "S.H.I.T." , (Ship High In Transit) which has come down through the centuries and is in use to this very day.   You probably did not know the true history of this word. Neither did I. I had always thought it was a golf term. :)   Courtesy of Siaryn Duggan Celtic Connection 517 6th Street Rapid City, SD 57701 (605) 381-1500   Courtesy of Sally Knight Midsummer occurs at summer solstice, when the tilt of the earth's axis gives those of us in the northern latitudes extra hours of sunlight. It is an unruly time, when the veil between the natural and fairy world is lifted. This phenomena occurs because the march of time measured by phases of the moon doesn't synchronize with the progression of the zodiac. Because the revolution of the earth around the sun does not coincide with the lunar year, the cycle of seasons is difficult to quantify in the logical calibrations of calendars and clocks. Perhaps this is why ancient astronomers feared that without intervention, nature would deteriorate into chaos. Fires were lit as sympathetic magic. Sun wheels were rolled down hills. Celebrants bathed in cleansing waters, and sacrifices were made. These sacred rituals intended to avert destruction were apparently successful. However, since this magic has been abandoned, the zodiac has slipped slightly out of its prescribed place and the calendar day migrated from June 24 to its current date of June 21st. The deterioration of time is most noticeable with the constellation of Gemini, because the month of the Twins is also the oak and solar month. Once, the rites of solstice would have been practiced when the sign of Gemini ruled the Zodiac. Twins and solstice are inextricably mixed in the magical practices of the Old World. Midsummer was a time to realign the lunar and solar calendars. Consequently, it is a festival of both fire and water. The Dragon which symbolized chaos that life comes from and returns to, is a fire and water creature. There is also reason to understand the Dragon as a metaphor for a year. For Celts, the New Year began when the old dragon was killed, and the new dragon emerged. Although different cultures mark the New Year at different times, the dragon metaphor can often still be identified. Stone age people apparently had counted off the year based on the earth's movement through the galaxy. Although time is easy to follow by watching the moon, keeping track of a solar year would have required the same logic and powers of observation that modern scientists use. Proof that those ancient tribes had this information exists in the form of a Paleolithic hercules figure. Hercules occurs throughout Europe, Northern Africa and Asia under many different names, but some characteristics are constant. He wears an animal pelt and carries a staff, club or wand made of oak. He was a rainmaker and fertilizing force. The oak tree was sacred to him because it attracted the lightning bolts of storms. Most of all, he was the sacred hero, the human incarnation of the sun. Midsummer is his day. Ancient people, watching the sky for a year would notice that although the moon is unpredictable, the constellations are a dependable indication of the time of the solar year. The year was divided into quarters based on the solstices and equinoxes, then each quarter was divided into three periods whose length approximated the length of a lunar cycle. The year and its twelve zodiac constellations are personified by the hercules and his twelve companions. But the moon was unruly. After all the careful observation and painstaking calculation, the single most significant time marker wouldn't match up with the fixed stars. While some ancient people may have gathered around the midsummer fire to ponder this enigma, others who were more literal minded and fastidious invented religion. Their reasoning was impeccable. Gods require human sacrifice. Whether flayed, hung, burned alive, torn limb from limb, impaled or beheaded, the victim's death mollified supernatural powers. In historic time, that is from about 5000 BCE, we know that it was the solar hero's duty to overpower the moon. In Shakespeare's Midsummer's Night Dream, this meant Theseus had to marry the Amazon Queen. One of Greek Hercules twelve labors was to steal Hippolyta's girdle. The Amazon Queen's girdle would refer to the Zodiac which the hercules ruled. Another of these famous labors was to steal the moon goddess's sacred hind with the golden horns. When the sun god bested the moon goddess the course of time is brought under control. Although details of Midsummer rituals vary throughout Europe, certain themes echo throughout the sun-worshipping lands. Summer solstice was a time of cleansing by fire and water, a time when enchantments of love and wealth were most potent, and a time when earth and nature spirits crossed over into the human realm. Golden treasures could be found by noting the location of magical flames that appeared on Midsummer eve. Young girls sought the identity of their future mates through a variety of magic spells. Fairies, and witches, walked the paths. Celebrants jumped over fires, or walked through fires in hopes of benefiting from the cleansing flames, and possibly in hopes of gaining some of the sun's power through association. Bonfires, fires fed with bones and bad smelling refuse, were ignited in hopes of driving off dragons who would otherwise contaminate wells and water sources. Torches were carried through fields to drive disease from crops, while cattle were led through fires to cleanse them of vampire-like creatures that may have taken residence between their horns. Sometimes a burning wheel that was meant to represent the sun, was rolled down a hill. Fires were burnt at crossroads and beside lakes. While primarily a fire festival acknowledging the sun's turning, water magic is particularly potent at this time also. Bathing in some pools had curative and restorative effects. In some places, washing in dew collected on Midsummer eve was magical, while in other places, bathing in water steeped with herbs over Midsummer night could cure and restore health and vigor. Because the forces of nature get out of control during this magical time of year, boundaries between natural and supernatural broke down. Shakespear caught the disorienting unruliness in A Midsummer's Night Dream. Puck usually used the night to play tricks on rustics, but when he had the magic pansy in his hands, he used it to help a distraught lover. Of course, for all his good intentions, the plan went awry, which is always likely to happen at this unruly time of year. This is also a good time to search for treasure that otherwise is hidden in the earth. Ferns or flames sometimes show treasure hunters where to look, but often restraints of strict silence have to be observed. So many people on the verge of becoming rich with gold, spoke or gasped, and broke the spell. Silence was also important to many of the love-charms and fortune telling that took place on Midsummer's eve. Farther south, in the arid lands that appreciated the watery moon rather than the hot sun, human sacrifice was practiced at summer solstice to appease the fearsome sun god. When the sun was at its zenith, the crops withered, pools evaporated, and ancient people mourned the death of Adonis, or Tammuz, the corn god. First-born children were fed to the sun god to turn his wrath. Even into modern times, animal sacrifice, as instituted by Abraham in Genesis, is practiced at this festival. Pilgrims drink at the fountain of Haggar, and first-born children thank their god that it is animals that are sacrificed. The dragon's part in ancient rituals are significant. Although it is possibly just a metaphor of the year, swallowing the sun and giving it birth alternately, it was also thought of as a contaminating force of nature, polluting the waters and withering crops. Effigies of the old dragon, or death, are burned in modern bonfires. Christians were not very successful in the attempt to claim this festival by fixing June 24th as the birthday of John the Baptist. Midsummer, being opposite on the Wheel of life from winter solstice, put St. John opposite Jesus, the Adonis of Christians. Already portrayed in Christian myth as twins, these two solstice heroes accurately illustrate Robert Graves' theory of dying gods. Jesus and John as twins, illustrated in early Christian art, were both blood sacrifices ruling opposite solstices. One mortal, one immortal, they depict the connection of modern religion with the ancient pagan rites. That St. John wears the animal pelt and carries an oak staff illustrates that he is just one of many hercules figures. In spite of Church restraints, this remains a festival of Zodiac heroes and magic. Magic is unleashed when Nature, sometimes personified as Salome, lifts her veil in Midsummer. Some of this magic can be harvested in herbs, flowers and fern seed . Mistletoe cut on Midsummer eve will cure all. Ashes from oak fires are magic aids to health and protection from storms and fire. This is the fairies merriest day. They might be willing to do you a favor, but they also like to play pranks now that they're loose. Put thistles around your barn so pookas don't steal the milk. Dance around the fire by the water with your sweetheart or carry a torch in a boat on the lake. This is the most magical time of the year, so remember to wear a sprig of thyme in your hair. Click to Nancy's Index or Click to SalmonRiver Home Page Nancy Sherer Send mail to Webmaster regarding any questions or comments about this web site. Copyright © 1997 - 2004 - Salmon River Gazette - All Rights Reserved Your Input Needed This newsletter would be far more interesting with your input: news, events, culture, history, photos, new Celtic businesses, anything. Submit your articles in MS Word doc and photos in jpg format. E-mail to info@BlackHillsCelticEvents.org . Merchant of Venice, Act IV, Scene 1 Some men there are love not a gaping pig; Some, that are mad if they behold a cat; And others, when the bagpipe sings i' the nose, Cannot contain their urine: for affection, Mistress of passion, sways it to the mood Of what it likes or loathes. Now, for your answer: As there is no firm reason to be render'd, Why he cannot abide a gaping pig; Why he, a harmless necessary cat; Why he, a woollen bagpipe; but of force Must yield to such inevitable shame As to offend, himself being offended; From Paul Smith We welcome any Scottish or Irish trivia from any member. Please submit your thoughts to Info@BlackHillsCelticEvents.org or contact Pat Hamilton, newsletter editor. The Sons of Norway host dancing lessons at the Canyon Lake Senior Citizens’ Center each Monday evening at 6:30. We’re learning some Norwegian dances and are preparing to learn some Celtic dances. Call John or Nancy Burke if you’re interested in attending as their summer schedule may vary a bit. This will be a regular feature of our Newsletter with your help. Please share any of your favorite Celtic Shopping locations with our Newsletter editor, Pat Hamilton. Send any suggestions to info@BlackHillsCelticEvents.org . Dream Shoes (Bald Mountain): http://www.DreamShoes.com/ They have great sandals and shoes for both men and women. Pyramid Collection: http://www.PyramidCollection.com/ Clothing, jewelry, goblets (mail-order catalog available) Creative Irish Gifts: www.ShopIrish.com Clothing, trinkets, jewelry, caps, mugs (mail-order catalog available) Cashs of Ireland: www.cashs.com Dishes, glassware, clothing (mail-order catalog available) Shannon: www.ShopShannon.com Clothing, trinkets, glasses (mail-order catalog available) Sofi’s Stitches: http://www.sofisstitches.com/ Medieval and renaissance clothing Gael Song: http://www.gaelsong.com/ (mail-order catalog available) Celtic Croft: www.kilts-n-stuff.com Kilts, clothing, jewelry, etc (mail-order catalog available) The Celtic Shop: http://CelticShopDunedin.com This is our old friend Coleen Coble’s web site. Check out her wide assortment. Meeting was called to order by President, Bill Knight. Treasurer absent, no report. Old Business: Midsummer Eve party will June 16 at the Knight’s house. Bill and Sally will be sending emails to members as a reminder. Storage unit has been acquired. Location is on St Pat St.. Moving date will be June 2. Gillette Celtic Festival will be on June 23. SIS and COA plan to participate. Camping facilities are available. Volunteers needed. Discussion concerning the SIS and COA merger. Questions toward bi-laws and local versus nation-wide focus. Committees still plan to meet. June 9 is the SIS rummage sale/fund raiser. Carole asks for a list of items, plus pricing. Scones will also be sold. Volunteers needed. New Business: St Patrick’s day & Burns dinners will be held at a different location. The Episcopalian church can no longer allow liquor on its premises. Membership drive briefly discussed. Standing Business: Kirk Spell is home. A get together was held at the Holiday Inn for friends and family. Aliyah has volunteered to find Celtic links to our website. Aliyah’s daughter, Lynida remains in Sioux Falls in a rehab facility and is doing well. Next BOD meeting will be at Jim Byrnes office on June 7. Program will be the Midsummer Eve Party on June 16. July program will be presented by Bill Knight on Independence day and our Celtic heritage. No minutes available at time of publication. President Bill Knight info@BlackHillsCelticEvents.org Vice President John Burke Secretary Heather Payden (Sally Knight, co-secretary) Treasurer Carole Conrad Board Members Aliyah Sanders, Kerry Smith, Jim Byrne, James Marrs, Paul Smith Past President Gary Hamilton Membership Sally Knight Web Site Gary Hamilton Newsletter Pat Hamilton, info@BlackHillsCelticEvents.org If you would like to contribute an article or story, list an event, submit a photo, etc. to the newsletter, please email the item to me by the 5th of each month. C:\Documents and Settings\Gary\My Documents\SIS\NEWSLETTER\Newsletter TEMPLATE.doc 1