God’s Circuit Rider

Some of you may remember The Kingston Trio. They sang about a friend of mine in the early 60s, but they never had the privilege of meeting him. The song was "The Reverend Mr. Black". During those days, I was a graduate student attending classes in Wake Forest, NC. The words I recall to this day: "He was a mountain of a man and I want ya to know / He could preach hot hell in the freezin’ snow." I often wondered about this giant of a man who "carried a Bible in a canvas sack", who in the song "was poor as a beggar but he rode like a king". The writers go on to say "sometimes in the evenin’ I could hear him sing / I got to walk that lonesome valley / I got to walk it by myself / for nobody else can walk it for me / I got to walk it by myself."

Over 30 years later, I met the man that Billy Edd Wheeler, Jed Peters, Jerry Lieber, and Mike Stroller wrote and sang about in their beautiful hit song that peaked in Billboard’s #8 position in 1963. He was God’s Circuit Rider, Ron Elerick. Robert Burns rode a horse as an exciseman. So did Sir Walter Scott. Ron road a Harley, and he ministered to "bikers" all over Alaska and throughout our mid-western states. He thought nothing of climbing on his "Hog" and riding down to California or through the Midwest. He mentioned to me in a 1997 letter that he had put 15,421 miles on his bike between June 4 and September 11 that year. When he replaced his old bike, there were 145,211 miles on it, ministering to bikers. I think, to paraphrase The Kingston Trio, "he rode the Harley like a king". Ron was a former Alaska State Trooper, minister, policeman, evangelist, and missionary to Africa among the Zulus from 1975-83. He once told me, "my life has been a great adventure".

His mother was Polly Shaw, and his Shaw blood boiled up in him and made him seek out his Scottishness regarding family and Scotland. He wanted to know more about Clan Shaw. He knocked on the right door when he called me because we hit it off instantly. There was a bond between us concerning our name and our Scottishness.

While serving as High Commissioner of Clan Saw, I asked our Chief, John Shaw of Tordarroch, 22^nd Hereditary Chief, to honor Ron as a Chief’s Lieutenant, and on 20 January 1999, papers were recorded in the Books of the Lord Lyon, King of Arms, Edinburgh, Scotland, to that effect. Soon after, Ron wrote in a letter that "apart from being a Christian (that is #1), the highest personal thing meaning the most to me is the appointment by our Chief to serve as one of his Lieutenants!!" Ron also served as the Commissioner in Alaska for Clan Chattan (USA), the "Cat Confederation".

Ron was a man of God, unashamedly! The last time I saw him was at the Pleasanton Scottish Games in California. On that Sunday evening we stood in the restaurant parking lot, and he asked Howard and Marialyce Shaw, Susan and me, and his wife Cindi if we would join him in prayer as we made our way back to our separate homes in Alaska, California, and Georgia. One would be a fool to tell this man "No". I’ll always be grateful for that weekend we spent together.

Ron was a special man, a wonderful person who loved his fellow man with all his soul. He was a man of the cloth and a man of the tartan - his email name was "kiltedpreacher". If ever there was a true representative of a Highlander, the "kiltedpreacher" was that man.

Think back with me to when this country was being settled in the 1700s, and courageous men were pushing the seams of our boundaries ever westward. Can you imagine how dangerous the rivers must have been to those pioneering men and women? There were very few roads and no bridges. They took their lives into their own hands just to find a place to call home. As they crossed rivers, they would tie ropes to each other for their own safety. People needed someone to pluck them from the swift currents when the white caps of death beckoned. Beth Gay told me that such a person was described by the noted western writer Louie L’Amour as "He’ll do to ride the river with". That was as big a compliment as L’Amour could give to anyone. Ron Elerick was that kind of man. I’d walk any dark alley with him, not because of his mammoth size or herculean strength, but because of what was in his heart - loyalty, faith, and love. The old Shaw motto sums him up as well as any Shaw I’ve ever met, our esteemed chief included - "Fide et Fortitudine" or "faith and fidelity". I often thought of Ron and I regret, as we all do when it is too late, that we did not spend more time together.