If you are wandering in Strykersville, Johnson City, Staatsburg, or dozens of other New York towns, you may be startled to see newer, ruby red markers. This is not a manufacturing error, but a cause for celebration: red signals the commemoration of local folklore. Over the past seven years, the William G. Pomeroy Foundation’s Legends & Lore® program has erected 73 such legend-centric signs across New York State, ranging from well-known community legends, like the Headless Horseman in Sleepy Hollow and Champ the Lake Monster in Plattsburgh, to local oral traditions, like a cannon heist in Wilmington or a bear brawl in Queens.
Americans
May Baskets
Come springtime, generations of children in the greater Glens Falls area spent weeks making May Baskets to distribute to friends and neighbors on the first of May….The custom traveled to America, noted in the late 19th century by Lina and Adelia Beard in their 1887 book, The American Girls Handy Book: ‘A May-day custom, and a very pretty one, still survives among the children in our New England States. It is that of hanging upon the door-knobs of friends and neighbors pretty spring-offerings in the shapeof small baskets filled with flowers, wild ones, if they can be obtained; if not, the window-gardens at home are heavily taxed to supply the deficiency.’
The Folk and the Region
Defining the idea of “region” in American Folklore scholarship
Religious and Scriptural Paradies
The author examines parodies of religious texts in contemporary usage.
Garage Sale Folklore
An exploration of the pheonomenon of the “garage sale,” and an examination of its participants
Folklore as Wartime Propaganda
The Folklore of war time, shared by veterans
Rufus Rawlin’s Ride
An examination of the Ballad of Rufus Rawlin’s Ride
Popular Folk Synonymies
The author provides idioms of folk speech.