WannaskaWriter

    I've been reading about my paternal Scots-Irish heritage in a book written by James Webb, "Born Fighting." The author takes us back two thousand years and describes the various folk in what was to become Scotland, such as the Picts: the large-limbed, tattooed, red-haired madmen, as well as the Irish 'Scotti' hordes. (That'd be 'hordes,' McDonnell, not 'hores.' Whereas there was a bunch of intermarriages i.e., "Scots- Irish " you have taken it out of context - - again. Read the book.) I haven't read other books about the Scots-Irish yet, but in reading reviews about this book, I'm  encouraged to do so as I'm curious about my ancestral past on my father's side. I want a overall perspective of who these people were, and how it may or may not pertain to me.     As I wrote in my earlier post, "Culturally Anemic," family culture nor history was discussed as I was growing up. Perhaps my father was wholl...

   Whenever I think about quitting THE RAVEN: Northwest Minnesota's Original Art, History & Humor Journal (theravenjourna.com) - - (and it's frequency has increased as I age)- - I have but to look through our old issue collection and stop at The Larson Brothers issue, and realize that if not for THE RAVEN, I would never have met those amazing Larson brothers, learned about their remarkable family, embarked on a friendship with Orlin Ostby and his circle of friends and family (including Tom from Jamestown, ND, 'a Charlie Daniels look-a-like,') met a Holstein ox named Pum, nor did a bunch of other wonderful things all in the name of story writing.    Having a self-published vehicle in which to put my stories, illustrations, and digital images, as well as those of my friend Joe (The Blogings Of Chairman Joe) in the format of THE RAVEN, affected my life in ways I never imagined.    Because we started THE RAVEN out as a joke, I never gave it a thought tha...

     THE RAVEN came into being in 1994, but it was the act of writing that came into my life at full bore in about 1983. Since the late 1970s, early 80s, I had been writing letters to family and friends back in Iowa and learned later that some of those people had kept my epic letters as keepsakes. I also learned many years later, that other people had read those letters and retold those stories to other friends and others in their families. Remarkably, one such friend was Tom, a Jamestown, ND Charlie Daniels look-a-like, I met when my wife and I walked the Pembina Trail, from Pembina, North Dakota to Saint Paul, Minnesota, beside a Holstein ox named Pum and two-wheel ox cart for Minnesota's sesquicentennial birthday in 2008. His brother-in-law told a deer hunting story I wrote, Tom discovered, every year as part of their hunting season tradition. We both were astounded to say the least.     In college I made a name for myself in English Composition a...

    Thirty-one years in a factory, this month. I never thought I'd do such a thing, but then I come from a Scots-Irish family (paternal side) that had long tenures in the places they worked. At one point, in the late 1970s, my dad, his brothers, and I had worked 108 years, collectively, at the same dairy cooperative in Des Moines, Iowa. I worked there nine years, after high school, before I moved to Minnesota.     I think of my first weeks in the toy factory; I was ecstatic. I was glad to have a full-time job after being laid-off during the winter and just breaking even (if that). In those very early days, I worked for a local agri-business cooperative operating a remote anhydrous ammonia satellite station, filling farm applicator tanks, selling farm chemicals, erecting grain bins and doing a little service work, spring and fall. Beginning in 1983, I began working for the toy factory, summer into the fall, then was laid-off all winter. I'd never experience...