THE WORDSMITH MILL: Up On Stilts

Monday, February 6, 2012

Up On Stilts

***

Stilts have been around longer than you might think, and were probably first used primarily for the purpose of shepherds gaining a lofty view of their flocks, and would come in handy on a hillside or flat open meadow with little or no trees to climb for the same purpose. Since there were no roads, stilts were also used to follow the flock through marsh, brush, bush and through pools of water easily. The Shepherd's Crook was used as a third leg, of the stilts, forming a tripod and a comfortable high seat to watch over the flock. Stilts were in use in Ancient Greece, in the 6th century. They were also common in Belgium in 1411, where jousters fought in regular matches wearing stilts. A precursor to horseback jousting perhaps.

The plain old wooden handheld ones are not that hard to walk on with a little practice. I made a few pairs of handheld stilts when I was a young boy as many of us do. It wasn't until later in life that I got to wear stilts again to my surprise. While I worked at a slaughterhouse, I wore stilts that were aluminium and had straps and buckles to hold your feet firmly inside them. They were taller than drywall stilts. I learned to walk on them again quite easily but carrying around an 8" Butcher Knife when you're suddenly well over 10 feet tall and walking on a slippery wet cooler floor, forcing your way between beef halves wedged together liked sardines, pulling the top shroud pins, cutting tails, and hanging tenders off up to 375 carcasses, is an art form better quickly perfected. I once finished my job before the rest of my 3 man crew and headed into the lunchroom on my stilts. Alone, I bent down to insert money into the Coke machine and my stilts slipped out from under me. My legs slid under the Coke machine, where I remained hopelessly trapped until my workmates rescued me from my predicament 10 minutes later.

You've got Mail !

I'm not sure about the picture above, perhaps he didn't like to get muddy shoes or he knows something about keeping away from unfriendly dogs on his route.

Landes Region France

There are four types of stilts. Handheld made from wood. Peg Stilts, aka, Chinese. These are usually used by professional performers and strap to the foot and knee offering versatility. Drywall stilts are used by Drywall installers and Tapers; Painter's, Artists, Actors, Magicians. These stilts are considered the safest for slow walking and standing still. The last kind are Spring Stilts, that use leaf spring technology. These stilts were made to run, jump, flip and do acrobatics with. Ya..No, I think I'll stop at Drywall Stilts.

Drywall Stilts

No No.. I said, Short Skirt, Long Jacket !

The tallest stilt walk was performed by Australian, Roy Malloy, using a pair of stilts that weighed 50.6 lbs each at a height of 56.5 ft. tall, Roy took 5 steps while sensibly using an overhead safety wire. The longest stilt walk record took Zdenek Jiruse, 24 hours, covering, 76.17 miles in Czechoslovakia in 1992. In London England, a marathon was ran on stilts in 2008, covering 26.2 miles in 8 hrs, 25 minutes.