Travellers' appearance a sure sign Spring has arrived

By JIM BROOKS
Nelson County Gazette

Saturday, March 22, 2008 -- It's late March and the harbingers of Spring have arrived here in Nelson County.

Eddie Izzard and Minnie Driver star as Wayne and Dahlia Malloy in "The Riches," an F/X Network TV drama about an Irish Traveller family.

The sunny yellow daffodils are in bloom, breaking the late winter gray with their colorful promise of the coming Spring.

On desks, cubicle walls and kitchen tables, you find copies of NCAA college basketball brackets herald the annual devotion to March Madness, with our favorite Kentucky team at least making it to the Final Four.

And for those of us who live along the county's major corridors, nothing is a surer sign of Spring than the arrival of the Irish Travellers.

I'm surprised how many people have never heard of the Travellers. They are a close-knit community of Irish descendants who live mostly in South Carolina, Georgia, Mississippi, with a small group in Texas.

Like the Amish, Travellers avoid being a part of society outside their group or settlements. They avoid social contact with non-Travelers and generally keep to themselves.

The adult men in Traveller communities leave home each Spring and fan out across the Eastern U.S. as itinerant laborer. They travel the rural countrysides, offering their services as house and barn painters, driveway dressers, lightning rod installers, and so on. Travellers size up a possible project and then make their pitch.

Travellers have a well-earned reputation as scam artists and thieves. The quality of the materials and workmanship is suspect; typically the work is only good enough to last until the Traveller can collect and leave the area. While it may be true that a few bad apples spoil the reputation of the entire group, the evidence makes it clear that caution and common sense are warranted.

Last summer, the Georgia Governor's Office of Consumer Affairs issued a warning residents of the Traveller's and their "tradition of fraud."

"These descendants of Irish immigrants live in nomadic clans and make their living by perpetrating home improvement fraud and selling substandard machinery at huge mark-ups," the press release states.

"They are pavers, roofers, painters, repairmen who just happen to have left-over materials from a previous job, allowing them to offer huge discounts, but only if you act now. You will rarely receive a written contract from them, and if you do, the contact information will have only a toll-free number and a post office box, making it impossible to track down the conman when the homeowner discovers the inferior quality of the workmanship and materials."

'Let me make you a great deal ...'

When I first moved to my hill overlooking Cox's Creek, several of my neighbors told me of their experiences with Travellers and warned me simply "If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is."

Travellers stop by my house at least twice a year with offers to paint my barns, seal my driveway or whatever work they see needs to be done. They are the most persistent salesmen you'll ever meet, and before they are done they will convince you you've missed a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Such was the case several days ago when a strapping young man in his mid-20s came knocking at my back door.

He was smart enough to know family and friends use the back door. This astute young Traveller knew my guard would be down because I was expecting to greet someone I knew. After all, only strangers and salesmen come to the front door.

He introduced himself and told me he was there to paint my barns at a bargain price. He began talking about the high quality of his materials, complete with a fantastic guarantee. Seeing the skeptical look in my eyes, he began to cite the names of nearby farmers whose barns he had just painted.

He was a very smooth talker. I have seen few people who can make a cold call and get so much information to a customer in such a short amount of time as this young man did.

The tinges of an Irish accent flavored the tone of his sales pitch, which is a trait that's not uncommon among the Travellers I've met. The South Carolina license plates on his truck were another giveaway. This young lad was probably from the Murphy's Village, S.C., community of Travellers.

I decided to press for a little more information about his references.

I asked him when he painted the barns for my neighbors; his answer was evasive and he quickly moved back to the topic of the great deal he could give me.

He clearly didn't want to discuss the barns. He probably was not aware that we haven't had enough good weather to paint a barn door, much less an entire barn for two separate customers.

After concluding his pitch I told him no. Undaunted, he continued with greater fervor, promising an additional discount. After telling him "no" five more times, I explained it in terms he would unequivocally understand: No matter the price, I could not and would not pay him.

For the first time since opening my door he was at a loss for words. He smiled, wished me a good day and headed for his pickup truck.

I can't say for certain that this young man would have performed shoddy workmanship, used cheap materials or ripped me off in any way. There's no doubt he was a Traveller, and there's a long history of good reasons to heed warnings about employing them.

Apparently there are plenty of people who employ the Travellers, lest they would not continue their annual treks among the "country folks" (their term for non-Travellers). The desire to save money on a great deal is universal, particularly so for a cheap-skate like me.

The Travellers have a fascinating history going back hundreds of years and have their own unique language called Cant. Cant is a combination of Shelta, derived from Irish Gaelic, Romanes (the language of Romany gypsies) and English.

For a good start on researching Irish Travellers, visit Wikipedia or simply Google the term "Irish Traveller."