What Is A Mummer & Why A Parade?

The tradition of Mummery - dressing in outrageous costume to  perform silly dances, plays, & songs -  can be traced back to the middle ages. In Philadelphia, the Scandinavian tradition of ringing in the new year loudly and boldly, combined with the British new years tradition of dressing in lavish costumes to perform George & The Dragon (with much "tomfoolery") combined into a raucous Mummers display each New year. Before long the families and friends had formed clubs, and with much rivalry, sought to outdo each other in costumes and performances. Although parades were organized as early as 1890, it was in 1901 that the city proclaimed the Mummers Day Parade to be an official event in one location, and it continues today, making it the oldest Folk Festival Parade in America.

On New Years Day, individuals would “Mum” through their neighborhood. "Mumming" might involve a skit or a poem or song, frequently making fun of the ruling class, ending with a request for food or drink. The most popular  Mummers poem reads:

“Here we stand before your door,

As we stood the year before;

Give us whisky, give us gin,

Open the door and let us in.”

The word Mummer appears to originate from Greek Mythology.   Momus was the personification of satire, mockery and censure. 

During the middle ages and early renaissance,  groups of "commoners"  (the equivalent of today's blue collar workers ) became Mummers during European festivals & holidays.  They 
dressed in outrageous costumes, performed silly dances, plays, and songs, and ended by begging for money, food or drink.

 The mummers in this 14th century illustration are shown wearing masks of stag, rabbit, and horse head.

As Scandinavian immigrants arrived in what was to become America, they brought with them their tradition of boisterous end-of-year celebrations to ring in the New Year. This combined with the British tradition of their play St. George and the Dragon, which entailed lavish costumes and a bit of tomfoolery, began to build the basic structure of the Mummers Parade that we know today.

The 1929 Kennsington String Band

"Reciting doggerel and receiving in return cakes and ale, groups of five to 20 people, their faces blackened, would march from home to home, shouting and discharging firearms into the air while burlesquing the English mummers’ play of St. George and the Dragon." https://www.mrmummer.com/history-of-the-mummers/

 The British during the Revolutionary War held an extravagant, Mummer like farewell party for William General Howe in 1778, and  President George Washington regularly welcomed & encouraged Mummers the week after Christmas.

"From 1790 to 1800, Philadelphia served at the nation’s temporary capital, while the Federal City was under construction. Washington lived in the President’s House right on 6th and Market Street and is credited with calling upon the Mummers New Year’s Day to celebrate the holiday for all 7 years he lived in Philadelphia. Groups  would go door to door to recite poems, tell jokes, and friendly impersonations of Washington. In exchange, they received cakes and alcohol. They did this, not only for Washington, but as well as the residents in the area." http://quakercitystringband.com/a-history-of-mumming-how-the-mummers-got-here/

"Starting among a few friends, it was not long until the fever for going out New Years Shooting spread.  It was especially popular in the down town districts, and soon clubs were formed..  These clubs were naturally great rivals, and in consequence each tried to outdo the others in making a pretentious display."

Henry Muhlenberg, writing in January 1839 , reported, "Men met on the roads in Tinicum and Kingsessing, who were disguised as clowns, shouting at the top of their voices and shooting guns."

A Mummers Ball as Illustrated in an 1894 edition of the Inquirer

In 1894, the Inquirer reports "Nowadays, Instead of the bands of New Years shooters making a practice as in olden time of starting out early on New Years Eve and going from house to house of friends until the early morning light, when it may be well imagined many of the shooters were in such a condition that they were unable to parade, each club holds a New Years Eve ball in some well known hall in their district, to which their lady friend and acquaintances are invited...  It is customary at these balls for the lady friends of the mummers to present the clubs with New Years cakes.  The clubs take great price in these cakes and they are always carried around in the parade on New Years Day and partaken of on New Years night after the days doings are over."

An 1808 law decreed that "masquerades" and "masquerade halls" were"common nuisance" and that anyone participating would be subject to a fine and imprisonment. The law was never successfully enforced, and was repealed in 1859. 

This 1890 newspaper reports that "It is not many years since this annual masquerade was but a cloak for drunken riotous disorder and attracted only the noisy and turbulent."  "The Organized parades (in 1890) seemed, if anything, too serious"

According the the Philadelphia Inquirer, after the civil war, the Mummers celebrations became increasingly more large and rambunctious, and that was why they were organized into one, more manageable, event.  

An Illustration from an 1895 newspaper article on that years Mummers Day 

 But in 1894, The Philadelphia Times reported that the Mummers celebration "was indeed, tame.  Instead of 200 or more clubs as in the early 90s, there was a meagre fifty.  Instead of thousands in line there were hundreds.  Lastly, instead of a hub bub all over town, it was confined chiefly to the northeast district.."  Prizes were also awarded that year, and from all accounts, this had been a fairly organized, if somewhat drunken, event long before 1900.

"The custom of New Years shooting is one peculiar at least until very recent years, to Philadelphia, and may be said to fill the same place as Mardi Gras does in New Orleans or in a small way of the great carnival season in Rome.  Of late years the New Years shooters have attracted a great deal of attention among all classes of people and along our most prominent highways, on account of their gorgeous, elaborate, and expensive costumes, but in former timed they depended more for their popularity on their antics and laughable behavior, then on their make-ups." - The Philadelphia Inquirer, December 1894

The parades however, appear to have taken place all over the city.  In the fall of 1900,  a businessman by the name of Bart McHugh went to the city council  and suggested that all of the celebrations be organized into one location.     Along with John H. Baizly, they drafted a  for a New Years "Shooters Parade" around city hall.  The proposal was approved and the parade was planned.

Terms like "Momus" and "Mummers" were coined by the media, not the by the comics and fancies who viewed themselves as "Shooters".  This is why the organization is named the Philadelphia Shooters and Mummbers Association.  But for the 1901 parade, the committee decreed that "Police will restrict the firing of guns on New Years Night to the militia."  

McHugh and Blaizly are both credited with the creation of the Philadelphia Mummers Parade.  Part of Blaizly's obituary reads:

“The evolution of the Mummers' parade dates back to the time when John Baizley was the leader of his neighborhood gang in his boyhood days. At that time the lads, attired in weird costumes, would fare forth in search of cake, nuts, apples and money, in much the same manner as young revelers do on Hallowe’en now. Later, as they grew older, the boys organized into units and to the strains of music marched through the streets of their neighborhood, with Baizley always in the forefront. Gradually the residents came to look forward to the celebration each New Year’s Day, and even persons from other sections of the city would flock to South Philadelphia to witness it. Baizley worked out a plan to have his club parade on Broad street in the future and induced other clubs to join, so that ultimately, when he became a councilman and persuaded Council to recognize and appropriate prizes to the paraders, the Mummers' classic came into being.”

Mummers belong to one of 5 Divisions - Comics, Wench Brigades, Fancys, Fancy Brigades and String Bands. Read more (And see photos!) of the divisions here: http://phillymummers.com/divisions/

Golden Slippers are the iconic image of Mummery. The unofficial theme song of the Mummers is “Oh Dem Golden Slippers,” composed by James Bland in 1879. Hear it here - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oA2H0VJVY40

More Mummers Day Poems:

Cure I can for a noble fee,

From your complaint, I'll set you free.

I can cure by day and night

I can diagnose by sight.

The plague it is no pague to me

Get it, kind sir, and I'll set you free.

God bless the master of this house

Likewise the mistress too,

May your barns be filled with wheat and corn

And your hearts be always true.

A merry Christmas is our wish

Where'er we do appear;

To you a well-filled purse, a well-filled dish

And a happy, bright New Year. 

With a rink tink rink and a sup more drink

We'll make the old bell sound

A merry Christmas to you all

May happiness abound.

==================================

https://susquehannavalley.blogspot.com/p/history.html