Ross McConnell

Monday, April 27, 2009

This Day In Ross History

Michael Ross McConnell
b. Thursday 10 July 1952
d. Orthodox Easter Sunday 27 April 2008

~~~

Seasons they change
But with gaze unchanging
I have been waiting
Beyond the years
Now over the skyline
I see you're traveling
Brothers from all time
Gathering here
Come let us build
The ship of the future
In an ancient pattern
That journeys far
Come let us set sail
For the Always Island
Through seas of leaving
To the summer stars
~ 'The Circle Is Unbroken'
The Incredible String Band

~~~

Remembering Ross McConnell
http://www.mjville.com/?cat=7

Georgian TV On Ross McConnell's Death
http://www.mjville.com/?page_id=14

Saturday, March 14, 2009

This Day In Ross History

Ross Films
Antioch College
Thursday March 14, 1974

Shewing Myne Eye

Ross Song
I Wish We'd All Been Ready
(We've Been Left Behind)

Friday, October 10, 2008

This Day In Ross History

10:10:08
11:00 AM
Memorial Service
Spring Hill Cemetery
Lynchburg, Virginia

Michael Ross McConnell
b. Thursday 10 July 1952
d. Orthodox Easter Sunday 27 April 2008

Friday, September 5, 2008

This Month In Ross History

September 1975

Re-admitted to Harvard University, Ross was full of energy, enthusiasm, curiosity and humor. I stayed in the off campus apartment he shared with three very tolerant graduate students.

We ran rampant. Widener Library. Andover-Harvard Theological Library. The Harvard COOP. Occult bookstores. Harvard Square. Pennypacker Hall. An Ingmar Bergman film festival. Oven baked grinder sub sandwiches.

I learned that Ross' freshman class at Harvard had included Dave Duxbury ("Dux")
whom I had known in Colorado in 1969.

Ross would vanish for hours, returning with tales of world-class scholars and incredible research opportunities. During one consultation Maya expert Tatiana Proskouriakoff of Harvard's Peabody Museum expressed interest in a Native American Astronomy symposium.

So on Monday 22 September 1975 Ross and I hitchhiked to Colgate University in the Village of Hamilton, NY. The distance: 291 miles. One of our rides informed us that Sara Jane Moore had attempted to assassinate President Gerald R. Ford. We rode with an elderly drunk gentleman who cried as he told us about his wife and daughter. When police detained the driver, we paused to enjoy the blazing fall foliage that graced the rolling hills of upstate New York.

Arriving in Hamilton at 1:47 AM, we established a residence under the golden dome in the upper balcony of Colgate Memorial Chapel. I heard Marty Balin of the Jefferson Starship:
If only you believed in Miracles baby - So would I.

We stashed our packs behind couches in the lower level of Case Library and sat through numerous droning highly technical presentations. Our favorite speaker was the heavily accented University Of Guadalajara professor of pre-Colombian architecture Horst Hartung (Ancient Maya Architecture And Planning: Possibilities And Limitations For Astronomical Studies). During a break "someone" scrawled COLGATE TOO STRAIGHT - GET HIGH on a bathroom stall. Ross convinced a female Colgate student to let us stay at her apartment. Her roommate blasted Cat Stevens' Tea For The Tillerman.

Eventually we found ourselves drenched, penniless and stranded on the NY Thruway. But Ross entered the Howard Johnson's restaurant, eyed three young people and charmed them into giving us a ride to our door.

~~~

Edited versions of papers presented at the symposium held at Colgate University, Hamilton, NY, 23 - 26 September 1975:
Native American Astronomy. Anthony F. Aveni, ed. Austin: University of Texas Press, 1977. xvii + 286 pp. ISBN 0-292-75511-2

Saturday, August 16, 2008

This Day In Ross History

Tuesday, August 16, 1977

Ross hitched into El Paso, Texas, arriving via Interstate 10 in the early morning. I found him walking down Yarbrough Drive, North of Trawood Drive. At dawn Gaylon Page's collies barked loudly next door, reminding Ross of PeeDee and Numie, Ellen's griffin-like Rhodesian Ridgebacks from Greywood in Yellow Springs, Ohio. After chicory-flavoured coffee we sat down at the drawing board to plot another "flipped out" scenario involving the Great Old Ones. The day's musical selections began with "Bend It" by Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick and Tich (1966). That evening on El Paso's KTSM Channel 9 the lead story on John Chancellor's NBC Nightly News was the death of Elvis Presley. I loaned Ross a clean, wrinkle-free white shirt and we drove to nearby Juarez, Mexico for dinner at the Casa Del Sol. Ross feasted on a huge, freshly grilled black Boquilla Bass. Coming back through customs Ross proudly proclaimed himself a citizen of the United States of America with no contraband to declare. A Ross day to remember!