The Possee, harem, “Friends of Ruth”, actors, or … Who are they really?



They’re back. Once again “a bunch of little Ruthies” has descended upon WCC, this time in a group of five arriving from her New York township last Tuesday. That this is the fourth time visitors have come to Ruthie has surprised many at the school, putting far greater focus on this visitation than any other. Why are they here, who are they, and what are their intentions in regards to the school, are just some of the thoughts going through the minds of a student body totally unaccustomed to the sight, let alone the presence of so many Protestants among them.


Opinions vary widely on answers to these questions, even as the general tone when the visit was announced was one of fear. Even though this has mellowed somewhat over the visit, many just don’t know what to think. Some, including a WCC senior, consider these five visitors of the week as “Ruth’s harem” whatever that means. Popularly, most just call them “a bunch of little Ruthies” from their high similarity of appearance with Ruth. Some, however, questioned whether they were even Ruth’s friends. “We didn’t think Ruth had any friends,” commented a professor on Thursday for example of this viewpoint. The argument goes that Ruth wants to be seen as having a lot of friends and has simply used her popularity to perpetuate the idea that visitors throughout the year are her friends when there is, in reality, no connection between her and them.

How else could the “visitation” of so many “friends of Ruth” (F.O.R.s) be explained? Ruth is from New York, most believe, and these “friends” are supposedly also from there, making coming all the way to Wyoming a serious undertaking, one that most students think impossible to have simply happened unequivocally and truly so many times in a year.

With all this debate and questioning in the air, IIT then decided to investigate as a matter of course. Agents of IIT have been in close contact with these members of “Ruth’s posse” and can confirm as a basic fact that they do follow Ruth and interact quite often with her, disproving simply the conspiracy theory that they have no connection at all to Ruth, and are simply here incidentally, their presence attributed to Ruth “per accidens” in a matter of claim alone. Rather, they truly are present near her, are housed in her dorm during this visit this week, and have been observed at quite numerous times to be in steady communication with her. She herself claimed to know them as in an email last week but gave little details, the ambiguity ultimately supporting another theory about them that the Posse members themselves purport.

I can vouch for each of their characters and tell you that the ride may not be completely awful, but depending on your personality this may be a nightmare.

Ruth’s Posse in social interactions with other WCC students
But there remained much more to be discerned about them after this initial conclusion. Who are they and why are they here? Thus, IIT agents jumped extremely excitedly at the chance of talking to them; an extensive interview answering many of the community’s questions while also raising new ones. While their presence is related to Ruth as we now know for sure, rumors and testimony of the Posse itself brings into focus the whole question of Ruth’s presence here, through in fact its confusion.

The Posse is five, we discovered, Savanah and her sister Madison, Jordan, Isa, and Eleanor, Ruth’s sister. We began by interviewing Savanah, seeing as we did such an interest in the Posse’s visit. Fearing for her life, she finally murmured in a low undertone the true reason why this body so commonly called the “posse” has graced its presence upon the innocent town of Lander. Her true feelings were that she was “sick of following Ruth around” but was being paid by an unnamed acting company to “act as if she was a friend of Ruth. We’re getting paid New York minimum wage but it’s good because we’re getting paid even as we sleep for the job.”

This idea of being paid to act as a friend of Ruth is a quite interesting admission, not of course saying that she has no connection to Ruth as some have suggested but instead that Ruth is paying actors to give the appearance of her having friends. Ruth has long talked of her “posse” and several “friends of Ruth” have visited the school before, but this arrival was unlike the rest in its multiplicity of persons, and appearance of them attempting to enter the WCC world. But the school was prejudiced against this attempt. “Our casting company director”, she continued, “made us register as if we were coming to visit the school. Coming here, however, we were not treated like normal visitors. Lacking a free t-shirt and other deserved merchandise as well as a tour guide, we were forced to follow Ruth around in an endless current. Sucked into the whirlpool of her existence at WCC, we sought shelter in eddies whenever we were able to break free from the wings of her oh-so-motherly personality.”

The fact that these “posse members” took the job with all of its obvious downsides and dangers made us at IIT interested in how this six-fold multiplication of Protestants to our fair school took the experience of visiting a Catholic college. To this, she spoke descriptively at length of how she and her friends observed the “student creatures” and participated in “fine mandolin and fiddle howls long into the night, past the curfew hour, resulting in a great reduction in Ruth’s homework time.” Overall they took a deep interest in controversial philosophical debates far exceeding any action displayed by any past “friends of Ruth”. Topics included but were not limited to vaccines, Catholicism and Protestantism, abortion and life, homeopathy, homosexuality, feminism, and the reality of living in Upstate New York (which is far from the commonly renowned upper Manhattan or New York City, for all those who are wondering).

They visited classes, she admitted, and even though the school is prejudiced against their presence, they were well received in discussions in our fair halls of learning. Dr. Grove for one wanted Jordan very much to join the school after watching her visit his Philosophy 102 class, impressed by her enthusiastic participation in the class discussion. Even though the said posse is Protestant, to this Grove replied: “We like Protestants. Ruth is Protestant. Even non-Catholics have brains.”

On a less serious note, the Posse was quite surprised by the particularities of dance they experienced here. “The East-coast swing we knew is so different from the Midwestern style they do here,” Savanah continued. “There’s the chicken bird-like flap thing they do in the Midwestern style. They must do it that way because of the abundance of chickens out west. It’s so different in the New England colonies. Where I’m from, chickens are eaten before they’re able to flap. Here, they live to flap, and that may inspire this uncouth performance of mankind.”

Savanah was also concerned with making sure a common misconception about the Posse was answered. “We are not Amish,” she said but even beyond the fear that WCC students may have held this misconception was a broader fear that all five shared, “we do admit to a minimal fear upon our hearts in entering a den of bloodthirsty Catholics.” IIT has insured their security throughout the week, and minimal amount of blood has been shed on either side.

But the Posse also encountered Mormons in its visit, three female “elders” or missionaries, who, unexpected for them, not in foresight fear or its converse, they met on the street one afternoon. “We enjoyed their compliments, their paraphrased saying ‘Those are cute’ of the Posse’s dresses,” Savanah said. “Interestingly Ruth attempted to invite them to dinner but was unable to run rast enough to catch up with their fleeing figures.” Ruth is now training in hopes of having better success in her next sprinting encounter with Mormons. But, they were not converted to Mormonism during their visit, and rather fostered friendship with the very party they had been expecting to fear, joining them into their many community efforts, including a meeting of the Cowboys for Life and several sporting events. “We were included in Student Life, even attending volleyball night and attempting the great feat of getting the ball over the net. Even though we often failed we very much enjoyed partaking in this noble sport”

Here, Savanah admitted to actually knowing Ruth (gasp). “I had the ‘great pleasure’ [said in a sarcastic monotone] of hanging out and growing up with Ruth, which made me the best candidate for the role of playing her friend, as did the rest of the Posse. We may come back, but not as students, we’re here mostly for the money of this job we were hired for.”

R.I.P. Unidentified Posse Member (1999-2019)

The Posse arrived on Tuesday the 23rd as stated and is leaving here Monday morning, but their return home will be precarious and adventurous, with a great risk of being “stranded in Lander.” We were told their plans for going home, quite complex, or as they said, “not well-planned”. Ruth, who “we should not trust with our lives” is driving them to Casper, where they will “take a bus to the fair town of Denver city in the sky. We’ll sing in the streets to earn money to feed ourselves, hopefully without getting arrested, then spend the night in the airport, somewhere. Then, hopefully, the next day we return to Albany the next morning where my mother (Savanah’s), will pick us up to our own townships. The car only fits four, but there’s five of us, so please pray for that too as well.”


It sounds hard, but as Eleanor said: “Since most of us are pretty good Protestants, I think we’ll figure it out.”

Another surprising revelation was that although the Posse seems as in Ruth’s metaphorical image, partially due to the fact that their dress mostly came from Ruth’s abundant closet, that one of them, Jordan, had never yet ridden a horse. “Unfortunate” as her situation may seem, she nevertheless stayed on her’s when the Posse went riding this week. By their own words, of course, they were actors, but they said that in some way they joined Ruth’s family, on the way to “becoming a ‘good Catholic family'”. 

What this means we have yet to understand unless some metaphorical sense is implied. Savanah gave details of this “family”. So far from what we have gathered, John M., Matthew, Thomas, Kathleen, and selected Posses are said to be members of the family. But Dad? “We don’t talk about Dad”, Ruth says, leading to the possibility that this family or maybe Ruth herself is Mormon in at least some qualified sense. Stay updated for more in intelligence in this new conspiracy.
Ruth (second from left) with other WCC students

At this point in our interview with the Posse, Ruth came in, as Savanah intoned “She approaches” (in a tone that was a combination of Gregorian chant and modern ice-metal). Here the Posse and Ruth discussed their supposed experience together in a juggling troupe called the Merry Misfits. Thomas Urgo, a current WCC Freshman was part of this troupe of the Posse’s supposed past, that they claimed.


Savanah reiterated that as a whole, she and her company liked the visit, but with the aforementioned undertone of rejection, another of the Posse, Madison, claimed particularly to be disappointed that John did not propose to her. She would not disclose from which John she felt this rejection, but instead said: “leave out the last name so they’ll all wonder who it actually is.”

As this was a discussion of marriage proposals, IIT questioned the Posse on the subject of Andrew Russell, the cult leader of fourteen wives and counting, questioning whether he proposed to any of them. “He’s very strange”, Savanah continued, and they had a “very eventful foosball game with him where Andrew made odd noises and imitated Gollum.” “We expected a proposal”, another Posse member declared, “and his rejection because of our differences of faith, hurts to the cockles of our hearts.” These were ignored even as many daughters of Eve residing at WCC had the great honor of Andrew’s proposal almost daily and accompanying pretzel rings. Perhaps it’s a good thing though” another Posse member comments, and with a toss of her hair says, “it proves we’re at least less weird than Andrew. We don’t need no cult god proposing to us 87 times.”

Looking to the future, WCC students want the Posse to return as students. “They’d be a welcome addition to the community” offered Ben the Bridge, himself prime “real-estate” of the Sophomore class. Jonathan was more nuanced, or at least ambiguous, saying only, “What in the world?” And a Freshman was excited for their presence to balance out Ruth’s oh-so-sunny personality saying: “They’re more normal than she is. And they brought her good mood back.” But they will likely not actually come, even as they “look forward to returning to Lander separately”. “We may come back, they offered, “but not as students, we’re here mostly for the money of this job we were hired for.” 

So WCC can be sure of their presence at least in visiting in the future, to “sing, dance, drink and be merry out of one canteen” even as the chance that they will actually come as students is quite minimal and only in the realm of rumors as of yet. Theories have been purported over the last twenty-four hours that one student may be interested in the possibility of one day thinking about being interested in the school at least in potentiality for the sake of the slightest possibility of questioning it, but other students have come out on the condition of anonymity as to Dr. Grove wanting to give a full scholarship to Jordan, something, that “could maybe overcome” the fact that they are Protestant in their own decision making with regards to coming here as a student.
Taming the wild bulls that populate Lander’s Main St. Here the Posse members are captured in the act. Photo taken by anonymous Freshman with cell-phone
If they survive the trip home, which may not happen given the Kress family’s aversion to hospitals, they may come back for some reason or other in the mists of future time.

Pre-Posse Protestant/Catholic ratio
The Post-Posse Protestant/Catholic ratio has been unsettling to many:
Don’t worry; they’ll be gone by Monday

More information is soon forthcoming, but for now even as juniors stoically say they have no feelings about this matter, the Posse’s continued presence here until tomorrow morning has been among the greatest of mysteries in intent, end, and causes. Even though the presence of so many Protestant lassies raises the Protestant/Catholic ratio to an uncomfortable level, the student body is handling it well overall, so far, even in the midst of multiple claims of “spicy situations”. Fear preceded the arrival, but now, having survived most of the week, confusion and mystery now surround in the midst of so many rumors, quotes, and leaks.

Who really is the Posse and why are they here? We still don’t really know. Please tell us what you think or know.


[Note: This article, like nearly everything we produce at IIT is satire. Ruth has friends and they came to visit her. They are not paid actors and as Dr. Grove said: “We know Ruth has a lot of friends: The Ruthie Toothie concert proves it.” Nor does either party, Protestant or Catholic, have any major issues getting along with another: For we are all God’s children and for many of us: Ruth’s]