Rugby's Chase Cain

The following story appeared in the October 29th issue of the Rockford Register Star and is quoted in its entirety:

Blowing out opponents by a 100-0 margin and roaring through the schedule with a perfect 8-0 mark would be enough to keep any team fired up week after week.But the women of the Eastern Illinois University rugby team — including three from the area, all in the starting lineup — are focused on a lot more than wins and losses.

As the first NCAA-sanctioned team, and considered pioneers for the sport in the college world, the Panthers are trying to pave the way for women rugby players of the future.

“Coach (Frank) Graziano always says we’re setting an example for all those who come after us. We’re kind of setting the pace for the rest of NCAA rugby, and that’s something to be proud of,” said EIU junior Chase Cain, a former four-sport, student-athlete at Jefferson.

“Plus, it’s just so much fun to play. I can’t believe how intense it is; it’s unlike anything I’ve ever done before.”

Cain, her former Jefferson softball teammate Emily Harrison, as well as North Boone graduate Sarah Sremaniak are all a part of something they never thought was possible. As members of the most influential team in the sport of women’s rugby, they are leaders in the purest form.

Eastern Illinois was the first to start an NCAA women’s rugby team back in 2002, and they were on the field last year and this year for the only two official college games the sport has ever seen. Up to a dozen colleges around the country have formed teams, but there have only been two games between two sanctioned squads, and the Panthers won both of them.

“I didn’t know anything about it. I just kind of got thrown in there and I picked it up. It’s very different from softball, that’s for sure,” said Harrison, a former special-mention all-conference catcher who also played some high school basketball.

“It’s really exciting to be a part of this.It’s something I never thought I’d do — play rugby, and be a pioneer.”

Eastern Illinois has been the most dominant team in college women’s rugby’s short history, and it has outscored its first eight foes of this season 528-39. The Panthers have left a 100-point shutout of Purdue and a 102-0 rout of Wisconsin-Stevens Point in their wake.

“We’re doing fairly well,” said Graziano, in his ninth year with the program. “Recruiting is the hardest part of rugby, but we’ve got some well-rounded athletes with that competitive spirit we always look for out there this year.“

Chase and Emily are perfect examples. They came over with no knowledge of the game, and they’ve grown right into it. They’ve taken on the challenge, and they haven’t backed down at all.”Cain is the team’s starting flankerback and is first on the squad in steals after tackle (10) and is the second-leading tackler (59) behind junior Stephanie Militello (76). Harrison, a sophomore flanker, has 16 tackles and has scored five points, while Sremaniak, a freshman halfback, has 17 tackles and also has notched five points.But even more important to them than the dominant numbers is the pride they feel when wearing the Panther uniform.

“It’s exploring the unknown, you know. And I get to tackle people; how cool is that?” Harrison said.

“When we all line up to go onto the field, and we’re standing there wearing our matching uniforms and all taped up and stuff, we know it’s intimidating. To be a part of a team like this is unbelievable.”

Last weekend’s game against Illinois was canceled, so the Panthers will get set to head to Clemson for a Nov. 5 matchup with the Tigers and a Nov. 8 showdown with North Carolina to wrap up the season. As of yet, there is no playoff format, nor is there enough teams to make up a conference championship bracket of any kind.But Graziano and his players feel like anything is possible in the future of college women’s rugby.

“I’d like to think we’re setting the model, so to speak, and that this can be successful,” Graziano said. “Eastern Illinois has shown everyone the way to go. These girls have been a great example of how it can work.”

Vibrant Volunteers

Pictured above are Barbara and Jack Merrell, caretakers of the Cradle of Forestry, at a dinner at the Pisgah Inn. Barbara, a retired high-school teacher, is in charge of all the volunteers. Jack, a former golf pro, is in charge of the food operation. They too are volunteers for the U.S. Forest Service.

Her we are, enjoying another meal together. We like volunteering.

V-aluable is the work you do.
O-utstanding how you always come through.
L-oyal, sincere and full of good cheer.
U-ntiring in your efforts throughout the year.
N-otable are the contributions you make.
T-rustworthy in every project you take.
E-ager to reach your every goal.
E-ffective in the way you fulfill your role.
R-eady with a smile like a shining star.
S-pecial and wonderful -- that’s what you are.

Author unknown.

Blue Ridge Blizzard

The upper photo is the Discovery Center covered in snow. The lower one is the volunteer RV area .

These photos were taken this morning by June Shaw who with her husband, Ron, has been a volunteer here at the Cradle of Forestry for three years. She took these great photos around the Discovery Center and RV area today.

We woke up this morning to snow, lots of it. The low temp overnight was 29 F.and the conditions were right for snow fall as the cold front rolled over the Blue Ridge at a pretty good clip.

The picture of our car and the motor home tells it like it is. There is an accumulation of at least 1.5 inches. We were told that snow like this has not happened here in a long time and we are about three weeks early for the first snow in these mountains.

It snowed for most of the morning and at least twice we had “white out” conditions as we watched the weather outside the front doors of the Discovery Center. By the middle of the afternoon, all the snow, and the excitement associated with it, were gone.

Trail of Tears

This is a photo of an oil painting by Robert Lindneaux which hangs in the Woolaroc Museum near Bartlesville OK. It depicts the 1,000-mile trek banishing the Cherokee people from No. Georgia in 1838. It could depict as well the similar treks to Oklahoma over the next 60 years forced on the Sioux from the Dakotas and the Apache from Arizona.

The term, trail of tears, generally refers to the route taken by the Cherokee Indians from North Georgia to the Indian territory in Oklahoma. It is also the title of a book by John Ehle (New York: Anchor Books, 1998, 397 pp.) which I have been reading from the Cradle of Forestry gift shop.

From 1795, when George Washington was president, the American policy was that native Americans should wear the white man’s clothing, learn the white man’s ways in school, including religion, and then, just maybe, the native American could be awarded citizenship in 50 years. It was not an enlightened policy of inclusion which should have respected the culture of native Americans.

The Cherokees had a sophisticated culture of their own. Women were respected and were the final authority in the Cherokee family structure. Men were also respected as providers, warriors and leaders. The social structure had many democratic features which worked well to maintain peace and social order.

The Cherokee nation, which inhabited northeast Georgia and the mountains of the Carolinas, assimilated the white man’s ways, lived in log lodges and reduced its language to written form, as Sequoya did with his syllabary. The irony was the Cherokees were the first to be removed from Georgia where over half of the eastern Cherokees lived.

When Andrew Jackson was fighting the Indian wars from Tennessee against the Creeks and the Choctaws, he hired Cherokee chiefs to recruit his forces and paid them handsomely to fight his battles. Later, when he was President of the United States, he openly plotted with Georgia leaders to banish the Cherokees from their lands, because a rich vein of gold was discovered in 1828 running from Dahlonega to the Nacoochee Valley, a distance of about 20 miles.

Population pressures caused by the gold rush and claims for deeded property and mining rights were so great that political leaders were forced to make choices. Indian nations owned land in common and no individual ever had a deed to where he lived. That's where the two cultures clashed and the Cherokees, far outnumbered by whites, were doomed to lose.

This is not a proud or happy story of early America, but it happened here where we have been this summer. Cherokees are alive an well in North Carolina, but gone in Georgia. We hope to visit Cherokee NC some day soon and tell about a little brighter side.

Lee's Walk in the Woods

Lee McMinn, part of the staff here at the Cradle of Forestry, gave a slide presentation the other evening, covering his walk in the woods from Maine to Harper’s Ferry WVA in the fall of 2007. Pictured here, Lee is a Forest Service employee who takes fees from visitors, since the Cradle is a fee area. Lee was the first person we met when we rolled in here with our motor home on September 1st.

Last year, 2007, Lee thru-hiked the northern half, more or less, of the Appalachian Trail [AT] from Mt. Katahdin, Maine, to Harper’s Ferry in a little over 90 days. He had hiked the southern half in four sections since 2003 from Mt. Springer GA northward.

Right up front, he made it clear he didn’t do it for any big existential reason -- finding God, himself or anything like that. He first saw the AT in the mid-1970’s and the idea of doing it all has been on his mind for 30 some years -- his personal “bucket list.”

“I guess you could say ‘because it was there’,” he told the group of about 18 of us Forest Service volunteers.

We’ve read Lee’s trail log of over 80 pages and understand his interest in hiking. Some days he got in 20 or more miles, we know from reading his log. He’ll hike during his lunch break and can get in at least a few miles. He hiked the AT alone, but found some compatible Kiwis, a couple, with whom he hiked during the majority of time on the trail. [We think that’s good because, regardless of skills, being alone on the trail is not a great idea.]

Lee divided the northern half of the AT into three parts, just like Julius Ceasar divided Gaul [Gallia est omis divisa in partes tres]. 1. Maine, 2. The diner-to-diner route and 3. The rest of it -- these are the three parts of Lee’s hike last year.

Maine was the most challenging and at the same time the most beautiful. The 100-Mile Wilderness, he feels, is a misnomer because much of it was a walk in the park and he has the photos to prove it. However, he warned, watch out for those mud-sucking bogs.

The diner-to-diner route runs from Massachusetts to the northeast corner of Pennsylvania. This is where “real food” is available.

“Wherever the AT crosses a road,” Lee said, “you could be sure there was a diner on the road within a half mile in either direction.”

The rest of it involved Pennsylvania and Maryland. Once past Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania, a lot of the trail was “walking between farmers’ fields.”

Lee’s presentation was well received and enjoyed immensely. The last photo Lee showed was on the bridge over the Potomac at Harper’s Ferry. I remember it well since Georgia and I were there not too many years ago when we biked the mule paths on the Cumberland Canal from Cumberland MD to downtown Washington DC. Thanks, Lee, for doing this!

Metamorphic Monarch

The photo above shows to Monarch Butterfly chrysales which are about 7/8ths of an inch in height and about a half inch in diameter. We have four of them left here at the front desk of the Discovery Center. This happens to be a hobby of June and Ron Shaw who protect 150 monarch eggs per year and nurtture them through the caterpillar and chrysalis stages. The visiting public spends a lot of time enjoying this every day.

What you see here is a monarch butterfly which has broken out of its chrysalis, which is immediately to the left of the beautiful creature, about three hours before this photo was taken. We have a display at the front desk and this former caterpillar decided to hang on a small branch about 25 days ago, the chrysalis gestation period.

This morning the chrysalis started to crack about 10 a.m. and it was hardly noticeable because the hatching starts at the bottom of the chrysalis. From the photo you can see how the monarch extends and hangs next to the empty shell for up to four hours before it is able to take its first flight. It takes that long for the hatchling to extend and dry out. You can see that the butterfly is about three times the height of the chrysalis after hanging for three hours, soaking up the sun and drying its outer skin which is necessary to enable flight.

This miracle of nature was awesome to watch today. The Shaw's have a very interesting presentation about their monarch hobby at http://shawadventures.com If you would like to learn more, please google Butterflies in Your Back Yard or TheButterflyPlace

Soaring Sourwood

One of the brightest trees around here, deserving special mention, is the Sourwood. They get really bright red and stand out against the yellow leaves of the Eastern Birch. The one pictured here is in front of the Caretaker's Cabin, facing the maintenance area.

We saw a nuthatch this afternoon -- our favorite winter bird which we do not see in Florida. Black and blue with a white breast, combined with the unusual ability to march head-first down a tree trunk -- no belaying necessary. Winter is coming soon, folks.

Hi Crimson Color

We are really into the high color season now. Lois and I took a ride up on the Blue Ridge Parkway today and this is what we saw at Milepost 415 or so near the Graveyard Fields turnoff which reminded us of a Chicago parking lot.

We met a couple from Hinsdale IL, a Chicago suburb, and they told us they had come from Front Royal VA, meaning they had done over 500 miles on this meandering parkway. They said this is the best color they have seen on their entire trip.

Birthday Boy 76

What a great day this has been! It has been a perfect fall day with sun and more fall colors. The one photo was taken directly out of our front windshield window. The colors are changing daily. Lois took the other photo inside our RV just to let you know what a 76-year-old looks like.

Creative Camping

Old-style camping was being demonstrated this weekend at the Cradle of Forestry by the Schiele Museum of Natural History in Gastonia NC. Old style means the way it was in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s -- Teddy Roosevelt style.

At this time in history, the Pisgah National Forest belonged to George W. Vanderbilt of the Biltmore House. Gifford Pinchot, the first chief of the U.S. Forest Service and Dr. Alwin Schenck, founder of the Biltmore Forestry School, both foresters hired by Mr. Vanderbilt, roamed these woods and slept under canvas in the fashion demonstrated by these re-enacters.

Sleeping under canvas was only one part of camping back in the day. Cooking over an open fire, created either by friction or flint and steel, camp stools and outdoor clothing of the day are some of the other parts. You won’t see matches, cellophane, plastics of any kind, or the camping gear found on the Internet; none of these products existed back then.

I had the pleasure of meeting David Wescott of Rexburg ID, author of “Camping in the Old Style.” Steve Watts, educator from The Schiele, who lives in Charlotte was there. I also chatted with the Conley’s of Columbia SC who are teachers in their real jobs and who like to do this for recreation. It sure looks like fun.

The photos show four styles of canvas shelters -- the wall tent, the wedge, the pyramid and the “whelen” -- a kind of forester-style lean to. You can see all kinds of personal gear, including candle lanterns which were used back in the day.

Wescott wrote his book to provide us with an alternative style of camping and having fun. Our gift shop didn’t have his book so I intend to buy one from amazon.com. I’ve seen bits of it; it looks like an old Scout handbook. Mr. Wescott has given me permission to publish his e-mail address, so feel free to contact him directly if you have questions or any trouble acquiring his book. dwescot@aol.com

Coming into Color

In the next few weeks, fall colors around here will be in their glory. The locals divide colors into low, medium and high.

Some trees are a brilliant red. The photo taken from the Blue Ridge Parkway might be classified as low color but that will all change quickly in the next few weeks.

Prof. Kobliha from Prague

Today I worked the fee gate ($5 USD is required for each adult) and had the pleasure of meeting Prof. Dr. Jaroslav Kobliha, head of the Department of Dendrology and Forest Tree Breeding, of the Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, Czech Republic (www.czu.cz). He was escorted by a forestry professor from NC State and accompanied by two young Czech senior students who displayed a wonderful and friendly demeanor with excellent English.

The Czech forestry professionals are engaged with NC State in a forestry project of tree farming Frazier Firs for Christmas trees. Tree farming is popular farther north from here and the Czech people are also getting involved, looking to the universities as resources.

How appropriate, I thought! Here we have educators from the land of the Good King Wenceslaus learning with foresters here how to grow Christmas trees on a commercial basis.

Lois visited with them in the gift shop and told them how we had such a great time in Prague back in 1995.

As they were leaving, I had a chance to visit as I was on lunch break. I told them my family came from Burgenland (south from Bratislava and s.e. from Vienna) and that I had the pleasure of exploring Seewinkle. They recognized this preserve as being adjacent to Neusiedlersee in Austria. That made me happy to know that we shared common ground.

A day earlier we met a couple from The Netherlands who were visiting the Cradle of Forestry. We exchanged stories and talked about the American presidential campaign.

It is definitely a benefit of this volunteer job to meet people from other places who are visiting us here in the Cradle of Forestry.

Cold Mountain

Dot and Gentre may remember this -- Cold Mountain stands majestically to the west of where our road (Hwy 276) meets the Blue Ridge Parkway. We were there last night to enjoy a dinner at the Pisgah Inn and couldn't resist taking a few moments to enjoy the view as the sun was setting.

Cold Mountain is located within the Shining Rock Wilderness of the Pisgah National Forest about 15 miles (24 kilometers) southeast of Waynesville and 35 miles (56 kilometers) south of Asheville. The mountain lies completely within federal lands and is uninhabited. It rises to 6,030 feet (1,819 m) above sea level. It is the 40th tallest mountain in the eastern United States.

The mountain was made famous by the 1997 novel , "Cold Mountain," by Charles Frazier. A major motion picture based on the Civil War novel was distributed by Miramax Films in 2003. The movie was filmed in Romania and all this time we thought the location was West Virginia.

How wrong can one be?

Forest Festival Day

Today was Forest Festival Day and we all had to work. It was a day of high expectations, but fairly low results.

In previous years there have been as many as 4,000 people in attendance. Last year there were 1,700. This year, because of the gas shortage and the poor economy, we would be fortunate to have 1,000 (estimates among the staff were running between 600 and 1,000).

Lois and I were in the Cafe from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Then we were free for the rest of the day. All volunteers worked today and half had the morning and the other half had the afternoon shift.

The first thing we did was have cheeseburger-lunch outside, freshly cooked on this beautiful autumn day. The photo shows this food station was popular with long lines the whole time we were there.

The music program featured “The Hogtown Squealers” and the eclectic bluegrass of the “Quarter House.” We missed that because we were working. What you see in the photo is “The Dowden Sisters Band” with a bass, guitar, mandolin and banjo. The sound was good but we don’t know where the sisters are.

The third photo is where the biggest crowd gathered to watch traditional woodsmen skills competition between four colleges -- Montgomery Community College, Penn State Mont Alto, North Carolina State and Haywood Commmunity College, who hosted the event. Male and female competitors climbed poles, threw axes at a target, and cut logs.