And here’s a fun game for Jock Tamson’s bairns on tour in America… mark off all the Robert Burns statues in the States.
Scotland’s Tartan Army have been taking in the sights and sounds and bars of Boston.
And paying homage to Scotland’s Second Most Famous Scot.
Who they stumbled upon on their way to the iconic Fenway Park for the Red Sox’ Scottish Day.
And naturally put a traffic cone on his head.
On a podium
Not that they, or you, should be surprised.
As the Ploughman Poet pops up all round the world.
Bettered only as a dedicated non-religious icon only by Queen Victoria and Christopher Columbus.
Burns popularity derives, of course, from his poetry and his songs.
But also his rags to riches story, his everyman message and his rock’n’roll life.
And his legend and suppers which the Scots diaspora brought with them all around the world.
Miami nice
Bostonians will say a sad farewell to the Scots who are moving on to Miami for their final group game with Brazil.
Alas, the Miamians are yet to honour Rabbie although they could still.
Particularly with a certain half-Scots Commander in Chief living just up the road in Mar a Lago.
Now to my shame and I’ll no doubt have my Scottish citizenship reexamined on the back of this big reveal.
Of Yanks and Men
But I missed the Burns statue in my summer working in Beantown after university or return 35 years later.
While I was also too busy at the John Lennon Memorial in visits to New York to notice Burns’s place in Central Park.
Or the bronze figure in Garfield Park in Da Pope town, Chicago, commissioned and cast in Edinburgh in 1906.
And the bronze Burns in City Park, Denver, gifted by the city’s Scots Caledonian Club in 1904.
Burns Cottage industry
Now Burns’s popularity is shared by all stripes of American, North, South, East and West.
And across the globe with Rabbie popping up in more than 60 guises.
And to see just where they all are a bronze plate of the world with mini-Rabbies then go back to where it all began.
In the little village of Alloway on the west coast of Scotland.
