Carrying a buckeye
Carrying a buckeye is a good-fortune custom in Ohio, where the seeds of the state tree are kept as charms. At Ohio State, buckeyes have gone into coaches' pockets and players' hands on game days.
What it may mean
A buckeye charm often travels through other hands before it reaches a pocket. At Ohio State, an equipment manager once asked Ron Malone for a buckeye for a coach who liked to keep one for good fortune. Malone began picking them up in a local park and handing them to the football team before games, and his son carried on after him. The rowing team uses its buckeyes another way. Each time someone praises a teammate's hard work, a seed goes into an engraved jar that starts the year empty and ends it full. The seeds inside count how often the rowers noticed one another's effort.
Depending on how you saw it
One before the big game
On football Saturdays in Columbus, buckeyes pass from hand to hand near the field and hang as necklaces in the stands. Which ritual helps you walk into a big day feeling steadier?
Gathering them in the fall
The seeds drop in fall inside a leathery husk that splits open, and people pick them up in parks and yards. What do you collect every year at the same time of year?
Kept for years
A buckeye carried in a coat pocket dries and darkens a little but lasts for years. Which small object have you carried so long that you would notice its absence before its presence?
Why it happens in nature
The Ohio buckeye, Aesculus glabra, is a relative of the horse chestnut and was formally adopted as Ohio's state tree in 1953. Its pale yellow flowers open in late April to early May, and in fall the husks split to release large dark brown seeds. The seeds are poisonous to eat, though they were once used for lamp oil, insecticide and bookbinder's paste.
What folk beliefs say
Ohio (United States)
In Ohio, the seeds of the Ohio buckeye are carried as charms for good fortune, notes the herbarium of Ohio State University's Museum of Biological Diversity.
Source: The Ohio State University Museum of Biological Diversity, Herbarium, Ohio Buckeye (n.d.), mbd.osu.edu. View the page
Ohio State University
Before a 2005 game, an Ohio State equipment manager asked for a buckeye for defensive coordinator Luke Fickell, who liked to keep one in his pocket for good fortune. Ron Malone then began handing buckeyes to the team at every game, and his son Doug kept up the tradition after 2016.
Source: Aaron Nestor; Joe Camoriano (Ohio State News), A bag of buckeyes carries family tradition at Ohio State (2019), news.osu.edu. View the page
Ohio State University (rowing team)
On the Ohio State rowing team, a member who wants to praise a teammate's hard work stands up in front of everyone and drops a buckeye, gathered from trees by the boathouse, into an engraved glass jar; by the end of the year the jar is full.
Source: Hlbrec (collector), The Buckeye Jar (USC Digital Folklore Archive) (2021), folklore.usc.edu. View the page
To reflect on
Whose hard work this week deserves a seed in the jar, and have you told them?