819 E Johnson St Madison, WI 53703








Years ago I got it in my head that creating and selling a line of collectible holiday ornaments would be fun and lucrative. After all, hadn't Hallmark built an entire evil empire on much less? Using the popular "glass pickle" as a model** we began concocting semi-credible tales involving foreign culture, holiday traditions and whatever plastic figures I had laying around. The plan was to sell the ornaments in my little store under the guise that they were prototypes for baubles similar to the glass pickle that had to be discontinued once focus groups got a hold of 'em. I called the line "Failed Legends" but "Feeble Attempts To Misinform The General Public About Holiday-Related Traditions of Obscure Cultures" would have worked too.

As you may have guessed, five years of Failed Legend production has not resulted in wealth, a life of ease or my own Evil Empire. Indeed, by the time all the tiny hats, cartons of cigarettes and fruitcakes are made I hardly break even. What makes it all worthwhile is seeing the look of confusion on a customer's face when they come into my store, read a legend attached to a statuette of President Chester A. Arthur, and ask "Is this true?" Healthy skepticism in the marketplace: It's about time.

To date we've created twenty-three different Failed Legends, although ornaments go in and out of production depending upon the availability of individual animals and presidential figurines. If you see one you like, you'd best buy it before our local craft store runs out of plastic hyenas, or Hallmark snitches up the whole idea and imports a more "up-with-people" line of legends from their Indonesian knick-knack mines.

THE POOP: All ornaments are ready to hang from a loop going through their tiny hats. SIZE: The "Failed Legends" storycard depicted with the ornament measures 1 1/2" x 2". Use your imagination to figure out the ornament size based on this.

(**Glass pickles are unremarkable little mass-produced pickle-shaped ornaments that come with a short "story" attached. You'll find lots of examples if you do a search for "glass pickle" on Ebay.)
 
 

 
 

Naughty children in Madagascar can expect a Christmas Eve visit and a lump of hard fruitcake from Naka-a-tewel, the river lizard.

 

  

Christian missionaries in Malaysia, unable to master a nuance of dialect, continually mispronounced "dowgang" ("savior") as "dugung" ("sea cow.") According to local tradition, the Christmas Sea Cow brings loads of fish to good children.

   Starfish have been used as Christmas decorations since ancient times to remind believers of the light that led the Three Wise Men. One species, the crown-of-thorns starfish, relates to other details of Christian symbology and is harmful to coral.
 
 
 
 

In December of 1912 Woodrow Wilson discovered the source of a persistent stench permeating the White House: a live turkey living under the desk of William Taft. The bird, pardoned by Taft just the month before, appeared healthy and considerably heavier than it had on Thanksgiving. When asked what his intentions for the bird were the outgoing president mumbled that he had been saving it "for later."

 

Residents of the Italian city of Taranto no longer believe that the bite of the tarantula causes a disorder that can only be cured by inordinate dancing. They do, however, dress hairy spiders in funny hats and drink to excess every Christmas. Just like the rest of us.

   In times past, Irish youth out caroling used to tap windows with a fake bird on a stick and ask for money "to feed the starving wren". The "Wren Boys Procession", as it was known, was outlawed once ruffians figured out that they could demand money merely by carrying larger, sharper sticks and not singing at all.
       
  The octopus' well-developed brain and nimble tentacles make it a target for lazy unskilled sea life seeking help with Christmas-related projects like tying bows and stringing lights. These persistent demands cause the kindly cephalopod to abscond itself in rocky dens and listen to Mannheim Steamroller until the season passes.   On Christmas Eve 1871 Chester Arthur wrote in his diary of a dream, wherein he was attacked by "a most heinous sea-crab, sulphur-coloured and squealing." Six months later he was forced to resign his post as the port of New York's collector of tariffs amid (true) accusations of graft and corruption. His accuser? Walter Crabbe, a sallow file clerk and pawn of Arthur's political enemies.    
     
 

In December of 1991 Eli Lilly issued a special promotional ornament to a group of three meteorological researchers stationed at the North Pole. Meant to promote a hotline for sufferers of Seasonal Affective Disorder the "Bipolar Bear" assured the men that help was just a phone call away.

Drug reps returning to the station the following spring discovered the dead bodies of two of the scientists covered in tiny polar bear shaped bruises. When questioned about the gruesome scene the third man, still grasping the ornament/weapon replied "This is the North Pole. We don't have telephones here."

  

The Berber creation epic tells of Mojar, the trickster hyena god. By stealing the mitten of Akbo (the vengeful god of the cold) Mojar brought 3 months of inclement weather to the world each year.

"Mojarishim" is the Berber term for the winter solstice.

 

In 1958 a Paraguayan girl awoke on Christmas morn to find that a feral anteater had torn open a gift from her estranged father. After shooing the plucky insectivore out the back door she discovered that her dad gotten her an antfarm.

The girl - deciding she didn't really like ants anyway - fed them to the hungry creature, who stayed. "Santy" became a beloved family pet and a reminder of Christmas serendipity for years to come.

 

 

 

 
Aardvark Art Glass / 819 E Johnson Street / Madison, WI 53703 / aardart@aol.com