Stone of Destiny

Christmas morning 1950, four brash and idealistic Scottish college students sneaked into Westminster Abbey during the wee-hours and stole the ancient Stone of Scone.  The ringleader of the heist,  Ian Hamilton QC, now eighty-five, was a Scottish Nationalist and at twenty-five was studying law at Glasgow University.

Though perceived at the time as a student prank, Ian always tried to make clear that he did it with political motivations. The Stone, at 26 inches in length and weighing a hefty 336 pounds, was not the sort of thing to smuggle out under your coat! It took a great deal of plotting in Glasgow pubs over pints of beer and more than a little good luck to pull off the scheme. 

Was it destiny to recover the Stone of Destiny?

The Coronation Chair in Westminster Abbey

Ian Hamilton calmly acknowledges, the moment of no return. ''You sort of know that when you take a crowbar to a side door of Westminster Abbey and jemmy the lock that there isn't really any going back, don't you?'' he said philosophically in a 2008 interview. ''Not when you know that the next thing you are going to do is steal one of the ancient relics inside.'' 

Ian Hamilton, QC

An eminent Scottish lawyer, Ian Hamilton, who rose to be a Queen's Counsel, and who retired only five years ago, is a shrewd man. One who could easily be mistaken for a pillar of the establishment. But then, appearances can be deceptive.  He urgently reminds listeners, ''that it was not stealing. It was a liberation. A returning of a venerable relic to its rightful ownership.''

In 1296 the troops of King Edward I of England, raided Scone Abbey in Perthshire, Scotland. They were searching for the Stone of Scone,  a symbol of Scots’ sovereignty, the coronation seat of Scottish kings for centuries.  Now that was stealing.

Edward took a personal interest in relics and symbols of nationhood. When he conquered Wales in 1282-3, Edward had the ‘crown of King Arthur’ and other Welsh treasures to be sent to Westminster in London.

Edward had a special chair built to house the Stone in Westminster Abbey. The Coronation Chair, also called St Edward's Chair or King Edward's Chair, was named for Edward the Confessor. A carpenter called ‘Master Walter’ carved the chair from fine English oak. He was paid 100 shillings.

For hundreds of years, kings and queens of England and later Britain have been crowned on the Coronation Chair, sitting above the Coronation Stone.  From 1296 to 1950, the Scottish Stone was ensconced at Westminster Abbey.

The fumbles and follies of that fateful Christmas theft are portrayed in the 2008 movie Stone of Destiny in which Ian Hamilton had a cameo role.  Amid the many problems and tense moments during the robbery, the Stone broke along an old crack.  

We watched the film on Netflex last evening (while the Jazz were being tromped by the Lakers) and thoroughly enjoyed it (not the tromping but the flick).

Westminster Abbey ~ November 2008

The movie opened in October 2008, just two months before I visited Westminster Abbey for Evensong on November 2.  At the time, I was unaware of the film or the significance of the Stone of Scone.

The rest of the story: After hiding the larger chunk of the stone in Kent, England for a few days, the conspirators risked the road blocks on the border (the first time in 400 years) and returned to Scotland with the piece, which they had hidden in the back of a borrowed car. The smaller piece was similarly brought north a little while later. Once in Glasgow, the Stone was then passed to a senior Glasgow politician who arranged for it to be professionally repaired by stonemason Robert Gray.

The return of the Stone to Scotland brought great national pride with celebrations throughout the country.

A major search was carried out by the British Government which proved unsuccessful. Finally in April 1951, the stone's custodians left it at on the altar at Arbroath Abbey for the safekeeping of the Church of Scotland. Of course, when the police learned of its whereabouts, they retrieved the Stone and returned it to London.  The students were charged and stood trial for their crime, but never served time.

In 1996, in a symbolic response to growing dissatisfaction among Scots at the prevailing constitutional settlement, the British Conservative Government decided that the Stone should be kept in Scotland when not in use at coronations. On 3 July 1996 it was announced in the House of Commons that the Stone would be returned to Scotland, and on 15 November 1996, after a handover ceremony at the border between representatives of the Home Office and of the Scottish Office, it was transported to Edinburgh Castle where it remains today. (Hurray!)

When there is a future coronation (Charles? William?) provisions will be made to transport the stone to Westminster Abbey for the ceremony and then returned to its rightful home in Scotland.

Note sub title warning: If you watch the movie, you may want have the dialogue at the bottom of the screen, as some of the Scottish brogues are very thick.





Our Desert Blossoms as a Rose

Utah? or Seattle? or Scotland?

I have to remind myself I live in a desert. In the first twenty-two days of June, eighteen were rainy. This is definitely not NORMAL. In fact, according to a local weather report it is 387% greater than normal.

I feel like we moved to Seattle and no one told me. I now live in Soggy Valley instead of the Salt Lake Valley.

In ancient times, the great prophet Isaiah proclaimed:

"The desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose. It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing. . .they shall see the glory of the Lord, and the excellency of our God. . .for in the wilderness shall waters break out, and streams in the desert. And the parched ground shall become a pool, and the thirsty land springs of water. . .and an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called The way of Holiness. . .and the ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away." (Isaiah 35:1-2, 6-8, 10)

My mother would be so proud of my roses!

The early Latter-day Saints who entered the Salt Lake Valley understood the words of Isaiah to have special meaning and application to them. Indeed the Salt Lake Valley was at that time a desert, a solitary place. But since then it has blossomed as the rose. . .and the roses have never been rosier than this year.

In 1847 trapper and mountain man, Jim Bridger, told Brigham Young that it was not prudent to bring a large population into the Great Basin until it is proven that grain can survive the cold. So skeptical was Bridger, that he told Brigham Young, “I would give $1,000 for a bushel of corn raised in the basin.”

I wonder if Brigham Young paid up.

Orson Pratt, one of the first Mormons to see the Salt Lake Valley, exclaimed, "an extensive scenery opened before us, we could not refrain from a shout of joy which almost involuntarily escaped from our lips the moment this grand and lovely scenery was within our view."

But not all of the pioneer party was so enthusiastic about the Great Salt Lake Valley. Harriet Page Wheeler Young on viewing the Salt Lake Valley said, “Weak and weary as I am, I would rather go a thousand miles farther than remain in such a forsaken place as this."

Oh, if Harriet could see the valley now!

The Geraniums have never been so grand!

The Delphiniums have never been so delightful!

The Ornamental grasses have never been so ostentatious!

Although I tire of the rain, I'm grateful for the cool temperatures. It will soon be in the 90s. The plants will wilt and turn brown to remind us we live in a desert. We'll forget the lush, green of spring and we'll sizzle in the heat of summer.

I get the news I need on the weather report.
I can gather all the news I need on the weather report.
Hey, Ive got nothing to do today but smile.
Da-n-da-da-n-da-da-n-da-da here I am. . .

(Only Living Boy in New York - Simon and Garfunkel)

Veteran Reunited With Dog Tag

Photo byBill Ingram

Sometimes you hear a story that warms the cockles of your heart. This was one of them.

I was driving home from the Family History Library yesterday, listening to NPR on the car radio as always. All Things Considered was on and the following lovely story was told about a connection between a young woman in New York City and an elderly gentleman in Palm Springs, Florida.

I couldn't pass up the opportunity to blog about it and I hope it makes somebody's day. It had me smiling all the way home.

"A week ago, 19-year-old Sydney Rector of the Bronx went to a music store in Midtown Manhattan with her boyfriend, Stevin Tyska.

When they left, they were playing around in a tunnel between 48th and 47th streets — and that's where they stumbled across a 66-year-old dog tag.

"It's a plastic tunnel and above you there's a waterfall," Rector tells NPR's Robert Siegel. "So you see the water falling on you; it's pretty cool. We were walking through, dancing around, being stupid, and my boyfriend saw something sticking out. And we always just mess with stuff, you know. We saw it, picked up and read it. I put it in my purse, and that's how it happened."

On the dog tag was the name Joseph Farish Jr., a serial number and the address 283 Cordova Road in West Palm Beach, Florida.

That night at 9 p.m., Rector looked up Farish and found a phone number for his law firm in Florida. She left a message for him, and the next day the 87-year-old World War II veteran called her back.

"I questioned her what was on the dog tag and I knew it was mine," Farish says. "I didn't realize I had lost it."

Farish says he was stationed at Camp Kilmer in New Jersey in March 1943. He says at that time he went into New York City twice — for a Broadway show starring Milton Berle and a USO going-away party. Farish was getting ready to ship to North Africa because he "got tired of lying around in the States" and "wanted to fight."

The dog tag "meant a lot to me," Farish says. "It brought back a lot of memories 'cause I went to North Africa and into Sicily. I was with the Big Red One [Infantry Division]. We made the landing on D-Day on Omaha Beach in Normandy and went all through Europe and ended up the war in Czechoslovakia where we met up with the Russians."

Rector returned the tag to Farish. But she says she believes she wasn't the first one to pick it up over the years.

"We figured that somebody saw it, picked up, dropped it. Somebody else saw it, picked up, dropped it," she says.

Her boyfriend Tyska agrees: "It probably has a long story."

Farish says he's thankful Rector returned the tag.

"I have to admire Sydney," Farish says. "She's a very kind and patriotic person to recognize that. To get it back to me is very dear to my heart. Thank you, Sydney."

"Thank you, that's sweet, no problem," Rector says. "Me and my boyfriend were talking about it and it's like it cost us a phone call and a stamp, you know? It didn't take much physical energy or exertion at all."

Joseph Farish, Jr. (photo by Bill Ingram)

Farish, who still runs a law firm in Florida, says it meant a lot to him to get his dog tag back from Sydney Rector. "

The fact that Mr. Farish is still alive and working is amazing. But even more amazing to me is the fact that two crazy teenagers would take the time to find him and return the dog tags.

Such a small thing to make an old man smile. Such a simple story of giving which sends good karma to the whole world.

Happy 200th B-day Abe & Charles

Last night we watched the fascinating PBS documentary Looking for Lincoln which helped me see our 16th President in a completely different light! It was two-hours well spent.

Today I logged onto the LOOKING FOR LINCOLN web site and learned that you can view the documentary online! Thanks to public media provider WNET.ORG. It is playing a major role in the nationwide Lincoln Bicentennial celebration in 2009, which besides the documentary is providing outreach project that explores the life and legacy of the man widely considered one of our best and most enigmatic presidents.

The documentary, presented and written by Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (African American Lives, Oprah’s Roots), addresses many of the controversies surrounding Lincoln – race, equality, religion, politics, and depression – by carefully interpreting evidence from those who knew him and those who study him today.

Professor Gate's quest to piece together Lincoln’s complex life takes him from Illinois to Gettysburg to Washington, D.C., and face-to-face with people who live with Lincoln every day – relic hunters, re-enactors, and others for whom the study of Lincoln is a passion.

Lincoln was not the man we learned about in school, the man we deify. He was much more complex, much more human. Somehow, his frailties and flaws make him more approachable. It makes his accomplishments even more astonishing.

The biggest surprise to me:

The man known as “The Great Emancipator” was not always intent on the abolishment of slavery.

Lincoln was raised to hold anti-slavery views and was against the expansion of slavery, but didn’t think that the Constitution gave the federal government the right to interfere with slavery in the states. After all, slaves were property--property protected by the Constitution.

His views on slavery were developed mostly for political and economic reasons. Additionally, in the mid-19th century it would have been an unwise political strategy to hold strong abolitionist views – if he had, Lincoln may never have been elected president!

The intentions of the Emancipation Proclamation are also steeped in ambiguity – did it actually free any slaves? The language of the document indicated that slaves would be freed in those states currently rebelling against the Union, but those states did not recognize Lincoln’s authority and thus did not adhere to the Proclamation.

It’s suggested that the Emancipation Proclamation was intended as a political maneuver to preserve the Union, and had little to do with the slaves. Regardless of Lincoln’s earlier views and intentions, he did ultimately sign into effect the 13th Amendment, permanently ending slavery in the United States.

Another great man was born on the same day in the same year as Abraham Lincoln.

Charles Darwin was an English naturalist who published on a variety of biological subjects. When he began his education in Cambridge, he was studying to become a clergyman for the Anglican Church. In his pursuit of knowledge about where species come from and how they are related, Darwin traveled the globe making detailed observations of plant and animal life.

Charles Darwin has contributed more to our understanding of the world around us than any other person in the last 2,000 years of Human History.

He is entombed at Westminster Abbey in London along with royalty, poets, scientists, philosophers, naturalists, admirals, and dignitaries of all sorts.

Here is a list of Darwin's pall-bearers:

George Campbell - The 9th Duke of Argyll

William Cavendish - The 7th Duke of Devonshire

Edward Henry Stanley - The 15th Earl of Derby

James Russell Lowell - The American Ambassador to Britain

William Spottiswoode - Mathematician, physicist, the Queen's Printer, and friend of Darwin

Joseph Dalton Hooker - Darwin's close friend and champion of his Theory of Evolution

Thomas Henry Huxley - Darwin's close friend and champion of his Theory of Evolution

Alfred Russel Wallace - Darwin's friend and the co-founder of Natural Selection

Sir John Lubbock - The 1st Baron of Avebury, Darwin's next door neighbor and close friend

HAPPY 200th BIRTHDAY MR. LINCOLN AND MR. DARWIN!!

You both changed the world.

Very Interesting

Starting in 1941, an increasing number of British airmen found themselves as the involuntary guests of the Third Reich, and the authorities were casting about for ways and means to facilitate their escape. Now obviously, one of the most helpful aids to that end is a useful and accurate map, one showing not only where stuff was, but also showing the locations of 'safe houses', where a POW on-the-loose could go for food and shelter. Paper maps had some real drawbacks: They make a lot of noise when you open and fold them, they wear-out rapidly, and if they get wet, they turn into mush.

Someone in MI-5 got the idea of printing escape maps on silk. It's durable, can be scrunched-up into tiny wads and unfolded as many times as needed, and makes no noise whatsoever. At that time, there was only one manufacturer in Great Britain that had perfected the technology of printing on silk, and that was John Waddington, Ltd.

When approached by the government, the firm was only too happy to do its bit for the war effort. By pure coincidence, Waddington was also the U. K. Licensee for the popular American board game, Monopoly. As it happened, 'games and pastimes’ was a category of item qualified for insertion into 'CARE packages', dispatched by the International Red Cross, to prisoners of war.

Under the strictest of secrecy, in a securely guarded and inaccessible old workshop on the grounds of Waddington's, a group of sworn-to-secrecy employees began mass-producing escape maps, keyed to each region of Germany or Italy where Allied POW camps were located (Red Cross packages were delivered to prisoners in accordance with that same regional system). When processed, these maps could be folded into such tiny dots that they would actually fit inside a Monopoly playing piece.

As long as they were at it, the clever workmen at Waddington's also managed to add:

1. A playing token containing a small magnetic compass.

2. A two-part metal file that could easily be screwed together.

3. Useful amounts of genuine high-denomination German, Italian, and French currency, hidden within the piles of Monopoly money!

British and American air crews were advised, before taking off on their first mission, how to identify a 'rigged' Monopoly set ---by means of a tiny red dot, one cleverly rigged to look like an ordinary printing glitch, located in the corner of the Free Parking square!

Of the estimated 35,000 Allied POWS who successfully escaped, an estimated one-third was aided in their flight by the rigged Monopoly sets. Everyone who did so was sworn to secrecy indefinitely, since the British Government might want to use this highly successful ruse in still another, future war.

The story wasn't de-classified until 2007, when the surviving craftsmen from Waddington's, as well as the firm itself, were finally honored in a public ceremony.

Anyway, it's always nice when you can play that 'Get Out of Jail Free' card.

Hysterical History

The next time you are washing your hands and complain because the water temperature isn't just how you like it, think about how things used to be. Here are some facts about the 1500s:

Brides carried a bouquet of flowers to hide their body odour as bathing was considered a luxury. Hence the custom today of carrying a bouquet when getting married.

Baths consisted of a big tub filled with hot water. The man of the house had the privilege of the nice clean water, then all the other sons and men, then the women and finally the children. Last of all the babies. By then the water was so dirty you could actually lose someone in it. Hence the saying, Don't throw the baby out with the Bath water.

Houses had thatched roofs-thick straw-piled high, with no wood underneath. It was the only place for animals to get warm, so all the cats and other small animals (mice, bugs) lived in the roof When it rained it became slippery and sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Hence the saying . It's raining cats and dogs.

There was nothing to stop things from falling into the house.. This posed a real problem in the bedroom where bugs and other droppings could mess up your nice clean bed. Hence, a bed with big posts and a sheet hung over the top afforded some protection. That's how canopy beds came into existence.

The floor was dirt. Only the wealthy had something other than dirt... Hence the saying, Dirt poor. The wealthy had slate floors that would get slippery in the winter when wet, so they spread thresh (straw) on floor to help keep their footing. As the winter wore on, they added more thresh until, when you opened the door, it would all start slipping outside. A piece of wood was placed in the entranceway. Hence the saying a thresh hold.

(Getting quite an education, aren't you?)

In those old days, they cooked in the kitchen with a big kettle that always hung over the fire. Every day they lit the fire and added things to the pot. They ate mostly vegetables and did not get much meat. They would eat the stew for dinner, leaving leftovers in the pot to get cold overnight and then start over the next day. Sometimes stew had food in it that had been there for quite a while. Hence the rhyme, Peas porridge hot, peas porridge cold, peas porridge in the pot nine days old.

Sometimes they could obtain pork, which made them feel quite special. When visitors came over, they would hang up their bacon to show off. It was a sign of wealth that a man could, bring home the bacon. They would cut off a little to share with guests and would all sit around and chew the fat.

Those with money had plates made of pewter. Food with high acid content caused some of the lead to leach onto the food, causing lead poisoning death. This happened most often with tomatoes, so for the next 400 years or so, tomatoes were considered poisonous.

Bread was divided according to status. Workers got the burnt bottom of the loaf, the family got the middle, and guests got the top, or the upper crust.

Lead cups were used to drink ale or whisky. The combination would sometimes knock the imbibers out for a couple of days. Someone walking along the road would take them for dead and prepare them for burial. They were laid out on the kitchen table for a couple of days and the family would gather around and eat and drink and wait and see if they would wake up. Hence the custom of holding a wake.

England is old and small and the local folks started running out of places to bury people. So they would dig up coffins and would take the bones to a bone-house, and reuse the grave. The bones were eventually burned in a Bone-Fire,thus the custom of bonfires. When reopening these coffins, 1 out of 25 coffins were found to have scratch marks on the inside and they realized they had been burying people alive. So they would tie a string on the wrist of the corpse, lead it through the coffin and up through the ground and tie it to a bell. Someone would have to sit out in the graveyard all night (the graveyard shift.) to listen for the bell; thus, someone could be, saved by the bell or was considered a ...dead ringer

And that's the truth...Now, whoever said History was boring ! ! !