Re: History of a SCAdian

[John Gahrmann <jrgahrmann@geocities.com>]

Poster: John Gahrmann <jrgahrmann@geocities.com>

> Alasdair mac Iain asked (forwarded from the EK list),
> >How did you first get started in the SCA and how old were you?  What made you
> >stay?  What did you do to develop your personna and why did you choose
> >it/them?

Johann von Rothenburg replies:


I was about eighteen at the time, I had just moved to Charlotte NC. 
(Sacred Stone) i was at a local arts festival, Festival-In-The-Park. I 
was walking along when I saw a guy forming steel over a portable forge 
(Karl von Nordmark). I walked over and watched for a while. When he 
reached a stopping point we talked for a while. He told me to stick 
around and watch, some guys were going to put on armor and fight. I 
watched them for a while and decided they were nuts. :) But, the armoring 
and smithing was really interesting, so I got directions to thier next 
meeting.

At the meeting, I met a bunch of folks and I found out there was an event 
coming up. Somebody gave me a flyer that showed how to make a t-tunic, so 
I went home and made a tunic out of an old sheet. With that, a pair of 
old moccasine boots and a antique sword that me and my brother had found 
in the attic when we were about 6. I was off!

Unfortunately, noone had told me about what to do at an event, so when I 
showed up I was feeling a little lost. I watched the fighting a 
while...somebody said it was a crown tournement. (I didn't have a clue 
what that was.) Some big guy wearing a long blue t-tunic over his armor 
won (I believe it was Gyrth Oldcastle) But the only person who really 
took time to talk to me was Karl. It looked like fun but, since nobody 
seemed to have time to talk to me and I didn't know anything, I got 
turned off. i went to some more meetings, cooking guilds and fighter 
practices but couldn't really hit it off, so I stopped going.

There was one other guy I had met that I got along with, Steve (Stephan 
Badger). A year or two later when he went off to college at NC state he 
found a SCA group. Apparently with the college they were better at 
working with new folks, so he encouraged me to come and give it another 
shot. This was Clair de Crecy's Investiture at Snow Camp. There I met a 
lot of really nice people, including my future knight, (then prince for 
the first time) Olaf. From then on, the SCA has become my favorite hobby, 
and I even came to enjoy putting on armor and fighting.

-- 
John Gahrmann
AKA Johann von Rothenburg
jrgahrmann@geocities.com
http://www.geocities.com/WallStreet/1567/index.htm
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