St Killians 2004

Excerpts from Edmund Fitgerald NTSB Report
The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the sudden massive flooding of the cargo hold due to the collapse of one or more hatch covers. (read more, click here)

Union group in Chicago,February 28, 2004

Winter 2003/4 meeting

A sure way to empty a room!

Top

---

---

The Good old days

How to Simulate Shipboard Life -
For Ex-Sailors Who -Really Miss "The Good Old Days"

Sleep on the shelf in your hall closet.
Replace the closet door with a curtain.
6 hours after you go to sleep, have your wife whip open the curtain, shine a flashlight in your eyes, and mumble: "whoops, sorry wrong rack".
While showering, turn off the water while soaping.
Put "lube oil" in your humidifier, and turn it on "high".
On TV, watch only old movies in the middle of the night, have your family vote on a movie to watch, then show a different one.
(for Snipes) Leave the lawn mower running in your living room for 24 hours.
Have the paperboy give you a haircut.
Once a week blow compressed air up your chimney, watch the soot land on your neighbours car, and laugh while he curses you.
Set alarms to go off at random times. When they go off, run into your yard, grab the garden hose and wet down your house.
Once a month take every appliance apart (whether they need it or not) and put them back together; hoping you do it right.
Invite about 20 people, that you don't really like, to stay with you for about 2 months.
Install a 6" fluorescent light under your coffee table, then lie under it to read a book.
Use 17 scoops of coffee for 8 cups of water, let it stand for 6 hours with the grounds still in the pot, and then drink it.
Hire a 50 tons truck to rush in front of your house to simulate the vibration. If it does not succeed to blur the TV picture as on board, hire a second or third truck.
Keep everybody inside the house for 50 days, promise them one free afternoon outside at the end of this ordeal, then when they are just about to leave the house, keep them inside because there is a trifle inspection and lock them again for another 50 days.
Every week day carry out one of the following : a fire drill, an evacuation drill, a pollution drill, a man over the roof drill.

---

After extensive archival research, the following affidavit is offered up for the perusal and edification of the Brothers and Sisters of the Schooner Union by member Jan Hale.

The Chronicles of St. Killian - Set down by the hand of Sean O'Liary, scholar, historian and schoonerman in this year of our Lord 1834.


Prologue:

Much mystery and misinformation clouds the origins of the ascension of an obscure Irish monk to his seat as the patron saint of schooner folk around the world. Here, to the best of my knowledge, is that story, as gleaned from sea lore, monastery documents, and local mythology.

In the early 1400's a frustrated young seafarer, whose original family name is unknown, left the sea and took up the cloth with an order of monks sited at Clogher Head, south of Dundalk Bay on the Irish sea. His quest was to devise a brew to sustain and succor sailors on their return from the ardors of the sea (the lack of such a brew being the cause of his frustration). The order he chose was famed for its breweries. He began to grow the finest hops and cultivate the finest yeasts for his quaff and soon was near attaining his goal. Then, to his dismay, he found that the local moose were eating his hops and sniffing his cultures of yeast (yeast sniffing produces a euphoric trance in rutting moose). The enraged monk set about to drive all the moose from Ireland. The older and more obstinate, he slew. The younger, he herded into large pens and planned to drown them by diverting a local river through the valley in which they were confined. But then he took pity on the young moose and chose instead to ferry them to a far off land where they could live, but not return to wreak havoc on his fields. He devised a huge ark with a hull of moose hides stretched over a wooden frame and rigged it with sails much in the manner of later sailing vessels known as schooners. He loaded his herds and set sail through the North Channel and then west, eventually reaching the shores of what is now known as Canada. There he released the moose and returned home.


His subsequent brews became famous and the local sailors heaped him with such praise that he was canonized and given the name St. Killian (Killian, in the ancient Celtic tongue, meaning "moose slayer"). As his beers had a reddish tint to them, many later schooners dyed their sails in a similar color to honor him. To this day, moose heads are a symbol of his sainthood and young maidens have been known to kiss the nose of these beasts as a display of gratitude.


After his death, an order of nuns assumed the maintenance of the breweries and they took on a red, rather than black, habit. The nuns would greet incoming boats and pass tankards of beer over their starboard rails, hence sailors always kept red nuns to the right when returning.


RESEARCHER'S NOTE:

As Easter has fostered such activities as"egg hunts" and "egg rolls", similar traditions have grown around the legend of St. Killian, including the production of colorfully dyed kegs which are hidden around the docks and for which returning sailors go on "keg hunts" (there has been talk of the White House lawn being used for an annual "keg roll" as well).

Top

---

The Port of Chicago hosted sailors from around the world on March 1st when the Chicago Maritime Society and Chicago Historical Society convened the first annual Chicago Maritime Festival.  Festival Directors and Great Lakes Schooner Union members in good standing Tom and Chris Kastle assembled an excellent fleet of workshop presenters as well as a top-drawer assortment of sea musicians for those fortunate enough to attend.

Workshops included “Remember the Eastland”, “Great Lakes, Great Wrecks”, “Schooner Passage”, and “Chicago’s Grebe Shipyard.”  A session titled “Ship Portraits” featured the fine art of Remy Champt, Union Founder and Port Agent for the Port of Traverse City.  Workshops were presented in the halls and rooms of the stately Chicago Historical Society building located near the Lake Michigan coast on Chicago’s north side.
The sounds of sea music could be heard throughout the day thanks to several groups and individuals.  John Conolly reunited with his old friend Pete Sumner to perform several songs from the album “Trawlertown” including John’s famous anthem “Fiddler’s Green”.   Johnny Collins, also from Great Britain and who has performed at many European festivals of the sea, was thoughtful in his choice of selections favoring songs of peace and understanding.  From the Netherlands came “Kat yn’t Seil” , a four piece group featuring wonderful harmonies and instrumentation.  “The 97th Regimental String Band”, which originated as a civil war reenactment group, brought historical costumes as well as period music and good humor from the mid 19th century to the stage.  All of these groups as well as the Polish-American chantey group “Mlynn” and Pacific Island singer Lanialoha Lee then performed a powerful evening concert in the Historical Society’s lovely auditorium with Chris and Tom leading the group with the final moving song; “Rolling Home to Old Chicago.”

Port of Traverse City was well represented at the festival including Port Agent Champt, Sally Somsel, Bill Giffels, Sara and Mike Litch, Alice and Web Buell, Carol and Gerry Inman and Janice and Allen Wolfe.  Several of Sally’s relatives, Anne and Mary Ellen Giffels and friends of the Inman’s also attended many of the events.  Several Union Cards were issued at a Friday night meeting prior to the festival and it is believed these cards may have considerable value in coming years as they were issued at the Port of Chicago.  We’ll follow up on this in the next century.  Special congratulations to Tom and Chris for a very successful festival.  Don’t miss it in 2004!

Top

---

Between the innocence of infancy and the recklessness of adultery comes that unique specimen of humanity known as a seaman. Seamen can be found in bars, in bed, in arguments, in debt and intoxicated. They are tall, short, fat, thin, dark, fair but never normal.

They dislike ship’s food, Chief Engineers, writing letters, sailing on Saturdays and dry ships. They like receiving mail, paying-off day, nude pinups, sympathy, complaining and beer.

A seaman’s secret ambition is to change places with the owner for just one trip, to own a brewery and to be loved by everyone in the world.

A seaman is a Sir Galahad in a Japanese brothel, a psychoanalyst with "Reader’s Digest" on the table, Don Quixote with a discharge book, Valentino with five dollars in his pocket and democracy personified in a Red Chinese prison cell.

A seaman is a provider in war and a parasite in peace. No one is subjected to so much abuse, wrongly accused, and so often misunderstood by so many as a seaman.

He has the patience of Job, the honesty of a fool and the heaven-sent ability to laugh at himself.

When he returns home from a long voyage no one else but a seaman can create such an atmosphere of suspense and longing as he walks through the door with the magic words on his lips:

Have you got the beer in????

Top

There is often confusion over nautical lingo on the Great Lakes. You might say that people connected with the Great Lakes shipping industry have kind of become bilingual since the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway in 1959. It's no secret that the nautical lingo of the Great Lakes differs considerably from that on the high seas.

An oceangoing vessel, regardless of its size, should always be referred to as a "ship". To the salwater sailor, a "boat" is simply the lifeboat hanging in its davits on the "boat deck".

Lake freighters, on the other hand, have been called "boats" for more than 100 years, even though their lengths have reached 1,000 feet.

click here to find more about the Great Lakes nautical lingo!

Top

---

1. If you spit, spit over the leeward rail.

2. There's nothing good about a boat that's tied up at the dock.

3. Don't piss off the cook.

4. If there's someone aboard who's mechanically inclined, call that person "chief" and stay out of the engine room.

5. Never get out of your bunk in a gale unless someone calls you.

6. Find out who went over the side before you call "MAN OVERBOARD!".

7. When you walk on deck, always carry a tool in your hand to look busy.

8. Don't take advantage of the deck hand; one day, he or she may be the captain.

9. If you feel you're going to be sick, you should wait until the end of your watch.

10. The main job of the crew is bitching, bitching,bitching,...

Top

---

"I want to be a Ship Captain when I grow up because it’s a fun job and easy to do. Captains don't need much school education; they just have to learn numbers so they can read instruments. I guess they should be able to read maps so they won't get lost.

Captains should be brave so they won't be scared if its foggy and they can't see; or if the propeller falls off they should stay calm so they know what to do. Captains have to have eyes to see through the clouds and they can't be afraid of thunder or lightning because they are closer to them than we are.

The salary that Captains make is another thing I like. They make more money than they can spend. This is because most people think captaining ships is dangerous, except captains, because they know how easy it is. There isn't much I don't like, except girls like captains and all the girls want to marry a captain so they always have to chase them away so they won't bother them.

I hope I don't get sea sick because I get car sick and if I get sea sick I could not be a Captain and then I would have to go out and work."

---

Top