RI Scottish Highland Festival

[Stirling Thompson]

Well I have officially gotten the first games under my belt! Maybe now I can relax a little and won't be so nervous when the next one rolls around in July. Anyway...

The Rhode Island Scottish Highland Festival was held Saturday June 12, 2010 at the Washington County Fairgrounds in Richmond, RI. They are a small games but very friendly and intimate surroundings. There were nearly 40 clans and societies in attendance with Clan MacDuff as the Honored Clan this year. For entertainment they featured the Scottish band North Sea Gas as well as Mac Talla Mor and Charlie Zahm. As a small games there were only three pipe bands in attendance but they had a harp group and historical reenactors complete with cannons! And of course the athletic, piping and dance competitions.

Representing Clan Thom(p)son at the games were myself, my wife Dot and two of my grandchildren, Alex and Leah. For the kids, this was their first games and they had a great time and they were a great help in getting everything set up.

All the pics are on my facebook page.
It was a lot of fun until the rains came! Luckily we got through the opening ceremonies before the rain. It rained quite hard at times and really thinned out the crowd as they all ducked for cover.

[Mary]

Hi Stu!

Hey, 40 clans isn't a bad sized games! Lots have less than 10 (especially in the past couple of years with people not having extra money to travel to the games for either running a tent or just an outing!).

I'm glad you didn't run into anything really bizarre....rain (storms!) is fairly common at these events. We carry the blue tarps with us so we can throw them over the table of stuff, tie them down and run for cover. They do a good job of saving the table items.....HAVE lost a tent here and there though.......  Tarping the tables overnight saves a lot of work of re-setting them up in the morning too. We don't leave our books overnight (too much money invested in them) but everything else non-paper.

Did you get the stamp we had sent so you could stamp the kids' passports at the games that use them?

Can I put your pics on the website Gallery?

Congratulations!  You're no longer a games-commissioner-"virgin"!
 

[Thomas Thompson]

Stu
  I am not sure 'virgin' is a apt description for you! BUT a loud Hooray for hosting the games.
I am curious, what was your impression of the public interest and reception of Clan Thom(p)son? I have long held the belief that the primary purpose of having a presence at an event was to establish our name recognition, and provide a heritage source for the Thoms'  who are  searching for their identity.
  Well, we (you) have broken the ice and are moving on to bigger and better things. As Ern taught me - Good on you mate!
Tom

[Stirling Thompson]

Mary and Tom,
No stamp yet so I just signed the passports 'Clan Thompson Society' and that seemed to work OK. Not sure but I think the people manning the tents outnumbered the visitors this year. Don't remember any Thoms introducing themselves and the most interest seemed to generated by the list of Reiver family names I had as a large framed display. Feel free to repost the pictures on the website they were meant to be shared with the clan.
Stu

[Barbara]

I know I'm late in posting Stu,  but wanted to tell you we are so lucky to have you in the family.   

Barbara