The Viking

I am standing at the end of the hall on the third floor of Christ the King Seminary in Olean New York. I am wearing a costume that I put together for a Halloween party...one of the rare social events we ever had at the school that I can recall.
I had seen Kirk Douglas in the movie the Viking and I decided to imitate his outfit. In the movie Douglas is attacked by a big bird Eagle or hawk and his left eye is clawed leaving scars of three talons top bottom and side. So first with the aid of Dave Yochim a classmate who had been a prop man for highschool plays I split a large marble and with face putty created itover my eye with the scars highlighted by red dye.
Earlier I had gone to the salvation army thrift store and bought the moth eaten old raccoon waist length jacket. This I took aapart to make the cape ovar my shoulders. From a fur collar on an old cloth ofrom the same source I made the fur briefs. The shirt under the cape was a sweat shirt inside out to look like wool and the sleeves which I took off and reversed became the leggings. Material from the lining of the coats I twisted to be the cord which held my leggings, the ties for the cape and the strap across my chest which held the scabbard for my sword. Dave Yochim completed the outfit by hand sewing a pair of felt boots out of some green felt like material he got somewhere. The sword was pieces of scrap wood from the workshop of the school covered with tin foil which I cadged from the nuns in the Kitchen. Overall it was a great outfit and I was in the running for best costume of the night but the judges thought that I was paired with another person who showed up in a tinfoil suit of armor and who kept challenging me to a duel. Lots of fun however and since the prize was only a candy bar , no great loss. Hope you enjoyed the story. It was in my second year at CKS, and I obviously had more time than common sense. But that's what being young is about. I hope that you can bring the picture in more closely because the work on the eye with the half marble and the make up was really the greatest part of the outfit.