Kilted in a Remote Area - Thanks for the Support

**macgreggor** · 12th March 05, 06:06 PM

Originally Posted by bubba

I live in a pretty small village and I know I'm the only one in town who even OWNS a kilt. They're mostly Dutch heritage here. To say I get looks is an understatement, but not much in the way of comments, folks here just don't do that. What comments I have gotten have been mostly good.

Pray for me Bubba, I am thinking of starting to wear a kilt when the weather warms up (July)! Dead in the center of Wisconsin. Will post and let you know the extent of the injuries. Hmmm, maybe I can get a few others from my dojo to wear kilts? Should put a stop to the (outloud) snide comments.
MacGreggor

**bubba** · 12th March 05, 06:12 PM

macgreggor, I've been wearing kilts full time for a year here in the Appleton area and haven't had much of a problem. Yeah, I've worn my kilts all winter. I think you'll be surprised at how fast people get used to it and stop noticing.

**Rob Wright** · 12th March 05, 06:21 PM

Graham I have you beat by a longshot. Year round population is 750. There was one other who owned a utilikilt and wore it fairly regular but he joined the army and I'm officially the village's eccentric.
As far as attitudes go, 90% of the population are extremely conservative rednecks who think the belt buckle of the bible belt is too liberal.
Being a very small community I know what is said about me but I don't care, I refuse to live by their rules and will go on being true to myself.

And as Ronn has said ,the support from you guys on this forum is a big help.

Rob

**Angus** · 12th March 05, 06:33 PM

Angus, where in Central PA? I don't wear my kilt full time, but there are quiet a few kilt folks around the capital area. Me, my eldest son, my daughter's fiance. One of my future son-in-law's friends family told him when he wore it out at Christmas time that her brothers would probably beat him up and that her father would think he was weird. My daughter just giggled and told them, no, don't think so.

About an hour and a half due north of you in Mifflinburg,Pa. Nice little town lived here all my life and have no intentions of moving. Great little place when you get right down to it.

**Verlyn** · 12th March 05, 07:14 PM

About an hour and a half due north of you in Mifflinburg,Pa. Nice little town lived here all my life and have no intentions of moving. Great little place when you get right down to it.

Well, there's a lot of hiking trails up that way and kilts are catching on in the hiking community big time. They may not "accept" it any better, but may just get used to it.

**arrogcow** · 14th March 05, 08:27 AM

Well, I don't live in a small town (I live about 1 mile from downtown Cincinnati), but with the exception of the owner of a local Scottish pub, I am the only regular kilt wearer I have seen in the area. Even celtic events are sparsley attended by kilt wearers.

Yesterday, I went to a small Celtic event and was there for nearly 2 hours. While I was there, there were at least 200+people in attendance. Number of kilts I saw, 1 mine, and one woman wearing a kilted skirt.

Last summer I sold UK's at our big Celtic festival which has an attendance of nearly 20,000 people. I don't think I saw more than 200 people in kilts the entire weekend and that includes pipers, dancers and the 50 UK's we sold that weekend.

However, I am fairly well known for the kilts, and hav had very little negative reaction.

Adam

**Magnus Sporrano** · 14th March 05, 09:11 AM

Not exactly a remote area, but far from where it is already considered "safe" to wear a kilt... I have an online buddy, Manny, who is a US Marine that currently lives in Savannah, Georgia. Not exactly a kilt lovers paradise. Manny is 100% Spanish/Catalan and tells me in the north of spain there are still a lot of men who wear Scottish-style kilts and there are tartans for that region.

From reading my journals on Multiply.com and some private conversations, he placed an order for a Stillwater kilt (I tried leading him to USAK but he did alright...) and went out in public in it. Even wore it to a party. He sent me some pics and he looked great in it. I'm trying to get him to join Xmarks but with no luck yet apparently. But we now have an agent in Savannah, so that's one less town wear any lurkers here have to worry about being the first guy to wear a kilt in public casually.

**Colin** · 14th March 05, 10:02 AM

Originally Posted by Magnus Sporrano

Not exactly a remote area, but far from where it is already considered "safe" to wear a kilt... I have an online buddy, Manny, who is a US Marine that currently lives in Savannah, Georgia. Not exactly a kilt lovers paradise. Manny is 100% Spanish/Catalan and tells me in the north of spain there are still a lot of men who wear Scottish-style kilts and there are tartans for that region.

From reading my journals on Multiply.com and some private conversations, he placed an order for a Stillwater kilt (I tried leading him to USAK but he did alright...) and went out in public in it. Even wore it to a party. He sent me some pics and he looked great in it. I'm trying to get him to join Xmarks but with no luck yet apparently. But we now have an agent in Savannah, so that's one less town wear any lurkers here have to worry about being the first guy to wear a kilt in public casually.

Magnus, tell Manny to look up Jim Byous of Savanagh kilts http://www.neokilts.com/Index.html as he may know of some kilted events around the area.

**Alan H** · 14th March 05, 11:38 AM

I work in the San Francisco Bay Area and work at Stanford University. I only live about 20 minutes from Rigged, but we haven't met up, yet!

Aside from Celtic events where I see a number of people wearing kilts...and Ren Faires where kilted guys (imitation great kilts) are all over the place, I've never seen another guy wearing a kilt. I know of half a dozen who own them, but have never seen them. Two of those guyshave Utilikilts, the others are traditional Scottish kilts.

I've worn mine once or twice a week for two months now and have had yet to get a snotty comment. I haven't had any "lifts" or "kilt checks" either....but then I don't hang out in places where people would do those sorts of things. All the comments have been positive. I've gotten a couple of stares, but the guys haven't said anything.

One of my lady sailing friends sent me an e-mail the other day telling me how surprised she was to see a construction worker pounding nails in a kilt last weekend. I sent her to the Utilikilts website.

I know full well that I live in a very **WEIRD** part of the country, where bloody well anything is just hardly noticed, so in that way I'm lucky.