, which I have always loved, and noticed that there was a link to "flibbertigibbet", a word introduced to my vocabulary by the movie.Apparently, in addition to being ye olde slange terme for "scatterbrained chatterbox", Flibbertigibbet was also a character in one of the local legends surrounding Wayland's Smithy, a barrow tomb in England, where some of the remains show signs of excarnation before interment.
What is excarnation, you ask? Why, the removal of the flesh from the bones so that only the skeleton is buried.
While this sounds like something that only heathen savages would do, General Mad Anthony Wayne, for whom a tenth of everything in Indiana is named, expired on the road home from Detroit. He was buried in Erie, Pennsylvania, but his remains were dug up and boiled down to the bones which were carried in saddlebags along what is now US 322 in Pennsylvania to the family plot on the other end of the state.
Apparently the General's ghost wanders the verge of the highway on his birthday, January 1, looking for stray skeleton bits that may have bounced loose when the horse hit a pothole.
We can always count on Tam not just for trivia, but minutiae of interest and education!
ReplyDeleteThanks!
gfa
Joe Vs. the Volcano???
ReplyDeleteWhy, Tam, why?
Jay G,
ReplyDeleteBecause color movies from the 1940s are cultural treasures, that's why.
LOL, good one and bits I didn't know :-)
ReplyDeleteFlibby caught my fancy when I first heard the name--back in the days when high school students were actually expected to read King Lear--and used to use the (full) name as a substitute when circumstances wouldn't permit the normal F-word to be used for cussing purposes.
ReplyDeleteDid not know about the Wayland connection, though. Thanks. (Though I had heard of Wayne's ghost. I think there are actually several ghosts wandering around the Northeast/Midwest looking, like he does, for lost body parts or other things they shuffled off with this mortal coil.)
Old NFO,
ReplyDeleteI found myself reading about US 322 and thought "How the hell did I wind up here? I was just reading about Joe Versus the Volcano" and started hitting the Back button to find out. :D
That's the only Tom Hanks movie I really like.
ReplyDeleteIt was common for the lordships who died at sea, or in forign lands, the practice was to gut them like a fish, and pack them in a barrel of rum to ensure freshness and identification so that the estate could be properly released.
ReplyDeleteA flibbertigibbit
ReplyDeleteA will-o-the-wisp
A clown
Lyrics from: What do we do with a problem like Maria?
From the Sound of Music, a color movie from the Sixties
That's where I first remember hearing it as a child.
Two thumbs up for "Joe" though, especially the luggage.
I've always liked that movie. "Take me to the volcano!!"
ReplyDeletePerhaps perversely, it's one of my favorites, too.
ReplyDeleteI worked as an extra on that movie - it gave me a brain cloud. Also, Tom Hanks is a very tall fellow.
ReplyDeleteSound O'Music = Nazis with machine guns vs. Crafty old Nuns (Early Masonic/Papist/Illuminati-with -chicks nexus, Pre Norm Brown DaVinci Code thing - or whatever his name is, Ed Brown? No that's my gun.)
ReplyDeleteMeg made the movie, 'nuff said.
ReplyDeleteCaptain Cook was also excarnated. That the Hawaiians ate him is a myth--say the Hawaiians.
ReplyDeleteKnowing about excarnation sheds a bit of light at the interplay between Henry V and the herald at the end of the St Crispin's Day speech.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAvmLDkAgAM
Great... I live off 322.
ReplyDeleteFine, Mad Anthony's ghost can borrow the bayonets and drink the beer. Unless it's the LAST bayonet or beer, then I'll be less than pleased.
322 is a useful route. It meanders across PA and runs through plenty of towns. Not the highest speed, but lots of interesting stops and makes a great secondary route.