The Flight of the Saltire

[M. A. C. Newsome]

I arrived at work this morning, and began my normal routine of opening up the museum, checking our email, etc., and thinking about going down for a cup of coffee. As I headed out the door, I felt something odd in the front of my kilt....

No, it wasn't that!

I looked down, and it seems that something had crash landed in my sporran.


It was the XMTSAS Saltire, come to Franklin to see me! It had flown in from Grantsboro on the other end of the state, where it had been visiting with BEEDEE for a while.

When I fished it out, it was so disoriented I had to remind it where it had landed.


I walked it across the street to assure it that it had arrived in the lovely town of Franklin, NC.


When I brought it back to the museum, it was very happy to see a couple of familiar faces.


Seeing its old friends helped the Saltire feel more at home, but it was still a bit parched from the journey. So we directed it to the gift shop's cooler for some refreshment.

It enjoyed a little taste of Scotland, as well as the "taste of the Carolinas!" It was especially happy to try some Pepsi, seeing as it had just recently been in New Bern, NC, where the drink was invented.

It's thirst now quenched, it wanted to see a tour of the museum, so I pointed it in the right direction.


In the museum gallery it had a great time seeing all the lovely displays. First the official Town of Franklin tartan, on the old farm loom in our "weaver's croft" display.


Near the loom, it spied our reproduction of the Christina Young arisaid. "Hey," it said, "We've been talking about Dress tartans on X Marks, I have to see this!"


Then it hung out for a while with some of the older kilts in our exhibits.

Both of these kilts are four yard box pleated civilian kilts from the very early 1800s.

It looked for the X Marks tartan on the display boards, but was dissapointed not to find too many tartans beginning with "X."


More to come....!