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(WSCO-sponsored events are on page 3)
March 7, 2009, Saturday – Annual Southeastern Ohio St. David’s Banquet, Oak Hill Presbyterian Church, 205 Cross St., Oak Hill, OH – 6 pm; Ticket information is available from Mildred Bangert (740) 682-7057.
March 7, 2009, Saturday – St. David’s Day Celebration, Radnor United Church of Christ, 4407 State Route 203, Radnor, OH, 43066 – 1 pm; Lunch reservations required, $10 – Rachel Thomas (740) 595-3319.
May 16, 2009, Saturday -- Fairfield County Fairgrounds, 157 E. Fair Ave., Lancaster, OH; 10 am – 6 pm
A CELTIC Gathering
Ken Evans
Mark your calendars now for this celebration of Irish, Scottish, WELSH heritage. WSCO will have a booth. Those who have Welsh costumes please consider wearing them and hang out at the WSCO booth at times.
There will be clans, bagpipes & drums, bands, fiddlers, harpists, story tellers, Welsh/Highland/Irish/Scottish dancers, classic European cars & motorcycles, cultural demonstrations, re-enactors, Gaelic language specialists, authors, silent auction, Celtic marketplace, ethnic & traditional food, design a tartan, historical research, genealogy, travel info, kilted mile, Highland games, stones of strength exhibitions.
Also, for the children: Children's Highland games, face painting, arts & crafts, Highland cattle, Sheep dogs, horses, corn hole.
Adults-$5.00; Senior citizens-$4.00; ages 6-12, $2.00; under 6- FREE; Parking-FREE
Their web site is under construction, www.lancastercelticgathering.com.
May 25, 2009, Monday – Memorial Day Celebrations in Radnor, OH; The day will start with a breakfast at the Radnor Congregational Church (United Church of Christ), followed by a parade and the services at the cemetery. There will be an ox roast at the community center. WSCO’s CWSS will be singing at the services. Contact: Rachel Thomas (740) 595-3319.
June 24-28, 2009 and July 1-5, 2009 – Smithsonian Folklife Festival; National Mall, Washington DC. Features WALES!!
The Smithsonian Folklife Festival is an international exposition of living cultural heritage annually produced outdoors on the National Mall of the United States in Washington, DC, by the Smithsonian Institution's Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage.
The Festival takes place for two weeks every summer overlapping the Fourth of July holiday. It is an educational presentation that features community-based cultural exemplars. Free to the public, like other Smithsonian museums, each Festival typically draws more than one million visitors. http://www.folklife.si.edu/center/festival.html.
September 3-6, 2009 – North American Festival of Wales, Pittsburgh, PA. http://www.nafow.org.
Keep up-to-date between newsletter issues -- check http://www.welshsocietyofcentralohio.org; click on Events and scroll to the bottom of the page for the link to Other Events of Interest.
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Jeanne Jones Jindra
This summer the 43rd annual Folklife Festival held on the National Mall in Washington, DC, June 24-28, 2009 and July 1-5, 2009, will feature Wales as one of three festival programs. “Wales” at the Folklife Festival will celebrate language, literature, and the spoken word; present crafts and occupational skills; share music and cooking; and evoke the spirit that basically powered the industrial revolution. It will also explore how age-old knowledge, skills and materials continue to be refashioned, recycled, and reinvented to meet modern demands and to continue to connect Wales to the world. In addition to the Festival, Wales’ presence will be extended through ancillary programs that will begin in March 2009, presented in collaboration with partner organizations in Washington, DC. These activities and events will include a wide range of contemporary arts and a focus on sustainable living and climate change.
The opening ceremony for the Folklife Festival will take place on Wednesday, June 26th at 11 am, and festival hours will be 11 am to 5:30 pm, with occasional evening events to be announced. Admission is free but book hotel reservations early as thousands of people visit the festival each summer.
More detailed information is available at www.folklife.si.edu/festival/2009. On the website follow the link to “Festival Related Recordings” to Welsh Folk Songs by Meredydd Evans. You can listen to song samples and also purchase tracks from this 1954 album www.folkways.si.edu/albumdetails.aspx?Itemid=1200.
Inaugurated in 1967, the Smithsonian Folklife Festival honors people from the U.S. and around the world to celebrate the diversity of cultural traditions.