Alan Skeoch

Author: terraviva

  • EPISODE 146 PUMPKIN CARVING…HUMAN AND ANIMAL…UGLY FOR SURE


    EPISODE 146   PUMPKIN CARVING…HUMAN AND  ANIMAL…UGLY FOR SURE

    alan skeoch
    Oct. 2020



    “Alan, you must carve the pumpkins.”
    “Why?  There will be no shelling out this  years due to Covid  19”
    “People like to see the pumpkins as they drive by…they are pretty.”
    “OK…I’ll get the butcher knives”

    What a  mess resulted.  My carving was not great but later I had help
    by carvers who used their teeth.  The end result is not good.



    “Alan, I see  you had help with the carving…no kids  will come by
    our house this halloween  for sure.
    “The squirrels…black and grey mostly…maybe even a red one.”
    “Where do they live?”
    “Not in any of our trees…no big balls of leaves  high up.”
    “Then where did they come from?”
    “Let’s just sit on the lawn chairs and watch.”

    “Holy Samoley…we have a bunch of black  squirrels living in our house…aluminum siding
    pulled aside way up top.”
    “Get the live trap…”

    alan skeoch
    oct. 2020

  • Fwd: EPISODE 145 LEGEND OF THE SKEOCH NAME

    EPISODE 145       THE LEGEND OF THE SKEOCH NAME


    alan skeoch
    Oct. 2020




    The Battle of Bannockburn IN 1314 was a bloody affair that seemed  to favour the English until their war horses  and soldiers  got mired
    in the muddy swampland at Bannockburn.   
    Before the battle of  Bannockburn a priest presided over the saying of mass as shown  here.  The Scottish soldiers bent their knees
    and  surrendered themselves to their God.  The English recon troops thought this was surrender to the English.  Bad error.  The priest
    above carried  with him religious relics of St. Columba, the Irish saint who converted the Scots … and also  dedicated the church of 
    St Skeoch near Craig and the chapel of St. Skeoch at Bannockburn.  One source  stated that the battle was fought on the Skeoch steading
    (Skeoch farm) .


    This painting is useful in that it shows  civilians on the battlefield helping the wounded.  Also a young boy who seems lost.

    Robert the Bruce fought with a battle axe as  pictured above.  With that axe he killed one of the English leaders .  TURNED THE BATTLE
    How wold  you like this battle axe planted  in your brain?

    I , ALAN  SKEOCH, SURRENDER….


    I give up.  Surrender.  My search for St. Skeoch has numbed  my brain.  You may have more
    strength than  I do  but I wager you do  not.  Try reading 502 pages filled with Scottish saints.
    And that was not the end of the book.  It took 502 pages to find St. Skeoch who is briefly mentioned
    under the heading ‘obscure Irish saints’.   A few years ago my good friend Ed Jackman who is
    a Dominican priest offered to search  for St. Skeoch in some book of the saints.  He never found
    her.  Yes, she is  female.   Now I understand why.  Scotland  is full of saints.  Seems to me that
    every well in Scotland has been dedicated to a saint.

    I have spent so much time searching for the old girl, St. Skeoch, that Marjorie fears I am becoming celibate.
    No fears.  I have put down the book of saints.  Leave it for a better person.  Maybe you.  Consult James 
    Murray  Mackinlay, M.A., Folk For of Scottish Lochs and Springs,  Ancient Church dedications  in
    Scotland, published in 1914.  It is on the internet word for word.  Hours and hours, three days off and
    on.  What did I find?   On page 502 I hit pay dirt…sort of.  Yes, Page 502!  “One of St. Columba’s companions  from Ireland (in 12th century) to Iona bore
    the name ‘Echoid’.  Bishop Reeves thinks that it is  represented in a corrupted form in the name
    of the ancient Forfarshire parish of St. Skeoch or St. Skay, otherwise Dunninald,  now included in 
    Craig.  Its church, which no longer exists, stood” near Elephant Rock north east of  Edinburgh.
    And there was a St. Skeoch chapel at  Bannockburn.

    Makes me tired  just putting this in print.  And it probably bores you, the readers,  silly.

    Why am I writing this?  Because of the legend…truth or myth about Skeoch origin.

    THE LEGEND OF JOHN AND  JAMES SKEOCH

    I think it was aunt Greta or maybe Aunt Elizabeth that first told me the legend.
    To them it was  truth I think.  The story came down through the family 
    orally.  Nothing firm.  Hearsay.  Let me put the story forward in as brief a
    way as  possible…using hypothetical dialogue.

    “Alan, our name dates back to the Battle of Bannockburn…1314”
    “How?”
    “After the battle ended  two young boys were found alive on the battlefield.”
    “How young?”
    “No one knows.  But young enough that they did not know who they were …very young.”
    “Who found them?”
    “No one knows…likely Scottish  soldiers combing the blood strewn field for weapons or
    things of value.”
    “What happened to the boys?”
    “They were taken to the chapel of St. Skeoch…chapel was at Bannockburn…boys taken there
    as orphans.”
    “Who was at the chapel?”
    “No one knows now…maybe a priest.  Chapels were smaller than churches usually
    and were places for prayer.   Tiny building likely.  The boys were taken there according to the legend.
    And given names.”
    “Names?”
    “They must have been very young if they did not know their own names.”
    “Or they were renamed.”
    “The new names…”
    “Named James and  John Skeoch.”
    “Is this true?”
    “The story has been passed down through the family.  And the names James
    and  John have  been passed from Skeoch parents to their first born males…through
    the  centuries.   In 1846 the two boys that travelled to Canada from Scotland were
    James and John Skeoch.  Your grandfather was  James Skeoch…he was the son
    of the little boy who travelled to Fergus in 1846.  His son was James Skeoch, killed
    in World War I..”
    “If this is true, then why am I not named James,?
    “Mom probably did not know the story, she was English,  and Dad did not really care.”

    (aunt Elizabeth named  her eldest boy James…as seems  to have been the tradition)

    “Let me get this straight.  Two little boys were found on the Bannockburn battlefield
    in June, 1314.  They were placed  in the chapel dedicated to St. Skeoch which was
    near the Battlefield.  Whoever took them in renamed them James and John Skeoch.
    And that is  origin of our surname.” 

    FINDING THE KERNEL OF TRUTH

    There is no record to confirm the story of James and  John Skeoch.  Nothing except
    hearsay.  But there are a few facts that give a bit of credence to the story.

    1) The Battle of Bannockburn was fought on the ‘Skeoch steading” (Skeoch farm)
    2) There was a  chapel dedicated to St. Skeoch on the Banncokburn field
    dating back to the 12th century and St. Columba.
    3)  St. Skeoch was a sixth century Irish saint.  
    4)  St. Columba dedicated a  church to St. Skeoch near Craig in Scotland…the chapel
    at Bannockburn also it seems.
    5)   Skeoch is  a place name … i.e. Skeoch Wood on the Isle of Cute, 
    village of Skeoch at Bannockburn,  Skeoch Hill in Lowland Scotland.
    6)  St. Skeoch is also known  as St. Skay

    I have tried to keep this Episode as  short as  possible because I know many
    readers will not give sweet goddamn about the Skeoch  name.  This is my
    fifth version of the story.  I cut out the whole battle of Bannockburn other than
    the date.

    alan skeoch
    Oct. 2020

    post script:    A  researcher named  Adrian Dyack recorded the following
    information on May 13, 2018.  Rather interesting.  I wonder if  he plowed
    through the Mackilnay book of saints as  I did.


    Discussion NO 7153

    Saint Skeoch Church or “church of St. Doninad” was first mentioned in the written record of 1161 when it
    was given by Ing Malcolm IV to Restenneth Priory.

    Saint Skeoch, or Saint Skae, as it is locally pronounced, appears to have received its name from a saint 
    of that name. St. Skae was given to the parish and to the chapel with its burial ground at the landward
    end  of the Rock of St. Skae.   At present the Rock of St. Skae is more usually known by its descriptive
    name of the Elephant Rock.  

    The Church of St. Skeoch seems to have been suppressed for some time as in 1576 it was written that
    “Sanct Skae or Dinnynum needs nae reidare” (Reader).   The church appears to have been restored about
    1587, as in that year Andrew Leith had  “a gift of life” of 3 chalders, 12 bolls meal yearly out of the
    bishoprick of Brechin for his services at the Kirks of “Marytoun, Inchbrock, Lunan and St. Skae”.

    The parishes of St. Skeoch or Dunninald were united  with Inchbrock or Craig in 1618 to form the new
    parish of Craig.

    Who was St. Skae?  A.J. Warden, writing in 1885, said that St. Skeoch is supposed  to be one of the twelve 
    disciples of St. Columba and a northern saint. There are three  saints of this name in the Irish Calendar.

    Dr. Reeves considers the word a corruption of Echoid or Eochaidh, which is found under the name of St.
    Skeoch in some of the south-western districts of Scotland.” 

    Norman Atkinson, Senior Servies Manager for Cultural Services, Angus Council and a former Curator
    of Montrose Museum has informed me, in recent correspondence that the church  was dedicated to St. Scaith
    known as Skae or Skeoch, who was one of the three maidens  Munster.  She lived in the early sixth century

    There is another Scottish church or chapel dedicated to her at Bannockburn and this is mentioned by
    Professor Geoffrey Barrow in his book of Robert the Bruce.  This Irish virgin’s feast day is usually 
    the 6’th of September but why she was commemorated in the church by the Rock of St. Skae is
    not known.

    The only ancient artefact which appears to be linked to the site was a small bone pendant with Celtic carving
    but this was removed from Dunninald and has never been photographed or recorded.

    Adrian L. Diack, MA
    Posed by Adrian Diack on St. 25 May, 2013


  • EPISODE 144 “GHOSTS COME FROM THE COFFINS WHEN THE SNOW BEGINS TO MELT, ALAN”







    EPISODE 144   “GHOSTS COME FROM THE COFFINS WHEN THE SNOW BEGINS TO MELT, ALAN”

    alan skeoch
    Oct. 2020


    This story is about a ghost. Sort of.   To make the story real we  have to go back in time to the year
    1948.  Too a stormy Sunday afternoon.   To a story about ghosts.   And then the story jumps to the present…
    to a sunny splendid October afternoon…Oct. 17, 2020.   The story has  legs so to speak, and  will be
    continued in Episode 145.

    (photo is similar to the bob sleigh in the story)


    FIFTH LINE, WINTER 1948

    “You boys  are cold..too cold.  Jump off the back of the slight and run behind, the horses cannot
    go fast because the snow drifts are too deep.  Running will warm you up.”  said our Uncle, Frank  Freeman,
    on one of  those miserable February Sundays as we tried to meet the Gray Coach  Bus at the
    corner of the fifth line and Highway 7.  We were going home to Toronto. We  visited our grandparents
    often on the Fifth line with the help of Uncle Frank and his horses.

    Uncle Frank was never really appreciated when he was alive.  We took it for granted that he
    and Aunt Lucinda would get up earlier on winter days and harness the team of horses then hook them up
    to the big bob sleigh just to get us back to the city.  This was not a  simple task.  Then Uncle 
    Frank had to turn around  and beat his way  back up the line to the barn where the horse harness
    had to be removed and hung on  big hooks beside the horse stalls.  Then some fresh hay needed
    to be pushed down to the stable from the threshing floor above.  Uncle Frank loved his horses.
    “A horse  is better than a tractor,” he told  me often, “Horses need to rest.  Tractors never rest.
    When the horse took a break, I got a break as well.”  I remember so much about those farm
    visits.  Especially that winter day.

    I remember that day clearly.  Eric  was 10 and I was 12 or thereabouts.  Uncle Frank  and mom
    were wrapped in big buffalo robes and coats.  Collars turned  up, scarves across their faces.
    This was not a nice day.  It was an adventure .  Eric  and I ran behind the sleigh.  Maybe a 
    bit fearful we would not keep up and be forgotten.  Not likely.

    But the trip was more than that because the only structure on the corner of the fifth line and
    Highway 7 was a small graveyard with limestone markers angled various directions.  The graveyard 
    is  still there.  Just the graveyard on the North east corner.  Nothing on the others.  Which means
    it was a scary place for kids like us.   Uncle Frank made it moreso.

    “Boys, when the snow begins to melt ghosts emerge from that graveyard.  Maybe not real ghosts
    but something strange happens.  A white mist flats up around several of the headstones.”

    Uncle Frank did not tell us this to frighten us.  He was simply stating what he had seen.
    “White mist around the old gravestones sometimes”

    That was around 1948…a long time ago.

    Today, October 17, 2020, there is no  snow,  no ice, no snowdrifts for the team to
    bust through, and Uncle Frank Freeman is  not around anymore.   But the graveyard is still
    there.  Abandoned really.  I always give it a  wide birth when going to the farm.  Probably because
    of Uncle Frank and the ghost story.  

    I STOPPED THE TRUCK…PULLED OVER.



    Today, Oct. 17, 2020, the little graveyard bursts with colour.  Maple leaves in their splendour.
    Ghosts?  What a silly thought.

     Ridiculous, there are no ghosts…and if  there
    were, they would not be whispy shadows in the graveyard  today.  The sun is shining,..the day is 
    warm…and the maple leaves are still splendid.  Might be a good idea to stop and walk into
    the graveyard…something you have never done in the past 70 years.  Do  it.”
     
    So I parked the truck beside the road  and strolled into the tiny cemetery to read the
    dedication stone erected  when all the limestone slabs  were gathered together.

    WHAT A SHOCK!

    I READ THE 1953 GRAVE MARKER WHICH SAID, “ERECTED BY THE BANNOCKBURN COMMUNITY”

    This will not seem shocking to any reader unless he  or she  is familiar with the Skeoch family and the 
    battle  of  Bannockburn deep in the history of Scotland  when a Scottish army lead  by Robert Bruce defeated
    the English at Bannockburn.    Another name for the place of this defeat is “the Skeoch steading”…i.e. the Skeoch farm.



    So what?  There is a legend that has been passed down through our family.  A legend.  A story that may or may  not be
    truse.  I am still unsure about some aspects of the legend but there is a core  of truth which keeps recurring associated
    with Bannockburn,  That legend will be the subject of the next Episode (145) for anyone interested.   Family history
    may not be interesting to anyone but the family involved.   Legends, however, do  have an appeal beyond particular families.
    So you may want to read the  legend and  help me find the core of truth.

    Getting back to the little graveyard.  There are no Skeoch’s buried here.  Most of the gravestones commemorate the Worden  family
    who purchased this tiny property for personal burials.  



    What interested  me was the use of the term “Bannockburn” which reminded me that our section of the Fifth line, Erin township was
    settled heavily by Scots…McLean, McEchern, Kerr, Leitch, Macdonald and others no doubt.  There  was a strong anti-English
    prejudice according to my grandparents, Louisa and Edward freeman, who were Welsh/English.   “It tooks some time for us to
    break down that anti-english feeling.  We did it with music.  I played the pump organ and Grandpa played the violin.  We were 
    needed.”  (my words, but true to grandma’s comment)

    In time, I got to know these Scots pioneer families.   But I did not know there ever was a Bannockburn community on the Fifth Line.
    That community is  long gone now.  What remained for a while, apparently, was the Bannockburn School which  was just north
    of the Bannockburn graveyard.  It is gone.  Gone Long ago for I have no memory of such  a school in my 80 years.
    All that remains  is this  tiny forgotten graveyard.   

    The ghost?   Well, the ghost is real in a way.  The ghost is “Bannockburn”.

    SEE  EPISODE  145  — TRACING A LEGEND

    alan skeoch
    Oct. 17, 2020



  • EPISODE 142 THOUGHTS ON A STORMY DAY…WE ALL HAVE THEM



    Begin forwarded message:


    From: ALAN SKEOCH <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>
    Subject: Storm 6
    Date: October 16, 2020 at 1:51:36 PM EDT
    To: Alan Skeoch <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>




    EPISODE 142     THOUGHTS ON A  STORMY DAY…WE ALL HAVE THEM

    alan skeoch

    Oct. 2020



    While we are still enjoying the  beauty of Ontario in October,  we all know

    what is coming.  November…  


    OCTOBER 16, 2020, MY BIRTHDAY CLICKS BY FROM SECONDS TO MINUTES TO HOURS

    So easy to mourn the loss of spring and summer.  So hard to welcome the late fall and  coming winter.

    The  storm clouds are already gathering.  But let’s not get our underwear in a twist.
    It is so easy to look at storm clouds and then transfer them metaphorically into
    the concrete tough times in our lives.  So easy to get depressed by what is coming…climate change,
    Covid  19, the U.S. election and lots more.

    Let’s not do that.  Those storm clouds I have tried to capture are quite beautiful…even
    readable if you want. Like the cloud below where i see a shepherd comforting his
    sheep.  (He seems male but who knows ?)




    I continuously marvel at our living world.  This envelope of oxygen, CO2

    and Nitrogen that is just in the right balance for us to thrive. I am not sure

    the universe holds many such  places as ours.  It is a treasure.

    And on stormy days coffee tastes better and  crawling out of a  hot bath tub into
    a warm bed has to be savoured.   Especially if it is accompanied by the pitter patter 
    of raindrops on the windows and the wind sweeping leaves from the maple trees
    so they can go to sleep as well.

    Lucky we live in a place with changing seasons.  Not all humans have that good
    fortune.  And I will grant you that not all humans want seasonal change. We
    just bought a thousand dollars worth of snow tires for our van in the belief those 
    rubber treads will keep us safe.  We know there is a down side coming…but the
    winter winds…the snow and the ice…can be quite stunning.  As you may see
    if I manage to keep these Episodes coming.

    “Alan, you could at least help with the dishes.”
    “Very true, I could.”
    “Well…”
    “Just give me a second or two to get this story arranged.”

    Marjorie, like most women, is a multi-talker.  I can only do one
    task at a time as she seems to have noticed.   I wonder how many
    Marjories there are in this world.  I hope lots.









    “Marjorie, how does rain happen?”

    “Oh, Alan….”

    “No,  I am serious.  How does rain happen?




















    We are made mostly of  water.  And water has a way of circling around from sky 

    to earth to ocean and back to sky again…then coming down in raindrops to start the circle

    all over again.   Without water we are nothing.   With water we are really something
    very unusual.

    And just as Marjorie and I drove home the sun burst through and lit
    up the highway with a rainbow.

    Stormy days are not bad at all.  Contrasts with the golden days.  All is good.



    We  are home.


    alan skeoch

    Oct. 16, 2020

    Sent from my iPhone


  • Fwd: EPISODE 141 “I TURNED 90 AND TOOK OFF IN A HARVARD….”, SAID BRAD SCHNELLER BREATHLESSLY



    Begin forwarded message:


    From: ALAN SKEOCH <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>
    Subject: EPISODE 141 “I TURNED 90 AND TOOK OFF IN A HARVARD….”, SAID BRAD SCHNELLER BREATHLESSLY
    Date: October 15, 2020 at 8:23:18 PM EDT
    To: Alan Skeoch <alan.skeoch@rogers.com>



    EPISODE 141   “I TURNED 90 AND TOOK OFF IN A HARVARD…”. SAID  BRAD  SCHNELLER BREATHLESSLY

    alan skeoch
    Oct. 11, 2020





    “Alan, What a day this has been,” said  Brad Schneller breathlessly.  He was so excited he could not
    even sit down on our socially distanced  lawn chairs.  He was flying high.  Why? Because he
    had been flying high an hour earlier.

    “I just turned 90 years  old and got my birthday wish…a  flight in a World War II Harvard.”
    “You did what?”
    “Sandra and the kids, Anne and David, Booked a joy ride for me out of Hamilton Airport…on a  Harvard .  We flew southwest
    to Caledonia…”
    “Dangerous?”
    “Suppose so.  The pilot told  me not to touch any of the controls.  The Harvard  was  used
    to train fighter pilots in World War II…two sets  of  controls.  I kept my hands  clear.”

    Brad  just could not sit down.  He paced up and down our lawn keeping his distance 
    …masked of course…but as excited as a kid in a candy store.
    Marjorie served them, Sandra and Brad, ice cream on a stick.  Brad wolfed his down
    as he described the flight.   Then he looked hungrily at Sandra’s which had not been eaten.
    Between bites he told us about the flight.

    “Flying in a Harvard has been a dream that I never believed would actually happen. Years  ago
    I remember a  Harvard coming to land on my friend Bill Greig’s farm near Rockwood.  It was magnificent.
    But beyond my grasp.  Then today, as I turned 90, the dream became real.”

    “The Harvard  only flies  on good  days…clear sky in other words…and today was  just
    perfect.”




    FACTS  ABOUT HARVARD HISTORY

    1The North American Harvards first appeared in 1937 
    2) 1939, first 50 Harvards delivered to the RCAF, Sea Island, British Columbia
    3) 1940, metal fuselage replaces  tube and fabric structure
    4)  1940-1, Canada receives 1200 American made Harvards
    5) 1941, Canada  begins manufacture of Harvards
    6) 1940 to 1945, Canada builds 2,800 Harvard  Mk 11B’s distributed  to 15 flying schools
    across  Canada
    7) Harvards were necessary bridge from the Tiger Moth to Spitfire fighter aircraft and  other
    front line fighters.
    8)1945, Canada keeps  some Harvards  as trainers but large number were sold to civilians
    9)1949, Cold War with the Soviet Union – Canada realizes it needs  Trainers again
    and leases 100T-6J Texans from the United  States Air Force.
    10) Canada orders 270 more Harvards toBE rebuilt by Canadian Car and Foundry, Thunder Bay.
    11) Harvards continued to be used as trainers until retired in1966
    12) 1938 to 1954, three were 20,110 Harvards belt, 3,370 built in Canada
    13) “Countless numbers  privately owned Harvards are still flying today.”
    14) The Hamilton Aircraft museum Harvards was built in 1953, sold  in 1965, donated back in 1973 by Dennis Bradley, Alan Ness and John Weir

    ANOTHER 1951 HARVARD BEING RESTORED

    • Status: On display
    • Airworthiness: Under restoration to flying condition
    • Type: Trainer
    • Built: 1951
    • Serial Number: RCAF 20213
    • Construction Number: CCF4-4
    • Civil Registration: CF-UUU
    • Current Markings: RCAF 20213
    • Length: 28 ft 11 in
    • Wingspan: 42 ft
    • Power: 600 hp
    • Engine: 1 x Pratt & Whitney Wasp R-1340-AN-1
    • Maximum Speed: 180 mph
    • Cruising Speed: 140 mph
    • Service Ceiling: 22,400 ft
    • Range: 800 miles

    North American Harvard Mk. IV











    “Alan, this day has become one of the best days in my 90 years.”
    (And Sandra, sitting opposite Brad on a lawn chair, smiled…happy for her husband)

    alan skeoch
    Oct. 11, 2020