It is said that in some communities contests were held to see who had the nicest asses in town. Here, today, you will find people with pride in their automobiles. On the Isle of Mann it was asses that held their interest. Today you will see whole families on a sunny Sunday afternoon out in the yard polishing up their cars. Over there they would be polishing up their asses. Today you will see young fellows standing around watching the girls go by in their convertibles. Over there they loved to stand on the corner and watch the girls’ asses go by. Today, teenagers can hardly wait until they can buy some kind of jalopy. On the Isle of Mann they could hardly wait until they were old enough to get a little ass. As you can readily see, asses were of great importance on the Isle of Mann. In fact, it is often said that some even tried to make asses of themselves.

Of course, everyone went to church. And naturally, when they went into the church, they left their asses outside. And everyone had a particular place that he left his ass including the minister, who always left his parked right by the well. At the tiny in the wee community where history was to be made that famous August Sunday, The Rt. Rev. McGeorge McYertle was the minister. On that particular day in the middle of the service, the church caught fire. To this day, the cause of the fire is still undetermined, although defective wiring has definitely been ruled out. Well, when the church caught fire, what was everyone’s concern? Naturally, everyone wanted to save his ass – and they all rushed outside, with the exception of The Rt. Rev. McGeorge Mcyertle, who was caught in the front of the church with no place to go but up into the bell tower. And so he did, feeling assured that his parishioners would be putting out the fire. Imagine his dismay when he looked down at the scene below! All his parishioners were just sitting around on their asses watching the church burn! And so he started to cry for help. They heard his cries – and now, the problem: How to get him down? No ladder would reach so high. Someone got the idea that perhaps he could jump on a load of hay which would break his fall. They brought up a load of hay, but alas, it, too, caught on fire. Someone thought of a net, but no nets were available. And then one fellow got a brilliant idea. The history is not quite clear as to who it was, although we feel that it was Agnus McPherson, who got the idea that if he were to just jump and land on his ass, it would break the fall and he would be saved. So they all took up the cry: “Jump and land on your ass! Jump and land on your ass!” You can imagine the minister’s terror at this point. He certainly didn’t want to leap that tremendous distance to where he could see his ass tied by the well so far below. But as the smoke and flames rose higher and higher, he had no choice. Finally, with tremendous intestinal fortitude he took a mighty leap and down through the heavens he hurtled. Unfortunately, instead of landing on his ass, he went into the well. And ever since, they have said that that particular minister didn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground. After they got him out of the well and dried off and back on his ass, he started back to the parsonage. As he was going down the dusty road, out from under the lapel of his tunic crawled a little gold turtle. He took this turtle home and started to feed it and nourish it and give it tender loving care. And under his care the turtle grew and thrived. However, the remarkable thing was that from that day forward it seemed that the minister could do no wrong – that his whole life changed for the better. His fortunes grew, and he became the wealthiest minister on the whole Isle of Mann.

And it is because of this story that McGeorge McYertle, on a hot Sunday afternoon in August on the Isle of Mann in the year 460 B.C. founded the Turtle Club!

Passed along by Bro. Barry Owen