Author Archives: Rebecca Southern

Snipe Hunt

Nationality: Caucasian, German-American
Age: 52
Occupation: orthopedic surgeon
Residence: New Orleans, LA
Performance Date: 3/25/13
Primary Language: English
Language: German, Spanish

My informant shared a story about a “snipe hunt” he went on when he was in boy scouts at age 10 or 11. The setting is having lunch at an Italian restaurant. This was also not the first time I have heard a story about snip hunting, my friends have told me that they used to dress up and go on snipe hunts as children. My informant grew up in Texas and California and my friends that have told me stories in the past grew up in Minnesota, which shows the universality of the practice. This informant is the same as my entries on the surgeon occupational lore and the cattle myth.

Informant: “So when I was a boy scout in Southern California, when we went out to summer camp, at night before we went to bed, the senior boy scouts took all the younger ones outside and said we were going to be going on a “snipe hunt.”  And that the snipe was kind of like a bird and an animal so it could fly and run around on the ground and it was brown and had sharp teeth and we were supposed to go try to find one and catch it. And so everybody was outside and the older guys ran off and all the younger guys were kind of scared and looking around and walking around and looking under the bushes looking for a snipe or something that looked like a snipe, no one really knew exactly what a snipe looked like. But you know in your imagination its kind of like a creepy, creepy squirrel with wings and sharp teeth and stuff. So you run around and the older guys were out in the woods and they were like throwing sticks and making noises and hitting sticks on trees, and rustlings the bushes so then you get kind of scared. Then you are all kind of walking along kind of quiet and then they all start screaming and yelling and running and everybody rubs back to the camp and then you find out that there’s no such thing as a snipe.”

Me: How old were you?

Informant: 10 or 12? It was a long time ago

Me: Did you do it to other people?

I: Oh yes! I had lots of little brothers to do it too. Yeah, definitely did it to my little brothers. They were in the boy scouts too. You guys did it to Moira

Me: we did? I don’t think so

I: Maybe I did it to Moira

The snipe hunt is a type of practical joke that was used as an initiation process for my informant in Boy Scouts. Once the young boy scouts learned the snipe hunt practical joke, they could then play it on other new Boy Scouts. The snipe is a real bird species, but few live in the US, which is how the snipe hunt ritual began being played on inexperienced campers. My informant tells this story because of tradition: he was told it as a child so he told it to his children. My informant also finds playing jokes on people quite entertaining. He also has an interest in animals, and he said if given the chance to find a real life snipe, he would. A snipe hunt is also a general term for any practical joke that sends someone on a “wild good hunt” or an impossible task. The snipe hunt is also commonly found among children across the country, in many states. I had friends from the midwest that have told me that they have gone on “snipe hunts” with their friends in the past. There are many examples of such snipe hunts, such as the bacon stretcher in restaurants or the double headed monkey wrench as in my technical theater entry, it is commonly used to play a joke on the “new kid.”

You cannot say Macbeth before the show

Nationality: Caucasian, Irish, German, and Bohemian American
Age: 22
Occupation: Graduate Student in Computer Science
Residence: Minneapolis, MN
Performance Date: 3/25/13
Primary Language: English
Language: Japanese, Spanish

This is the same informant as the entry on the gels for the lights. The setting is my dining room table. My informant has experience working in theater, and was on the crew for the show Macbeth.

Me: what do you mean?

I: Like, you can’t say Macbeth’s name when you are rehearsing. And you are supposed to call it “The Scottish Play” or something else because you can’t say Macbeth in the theater before a performance.

Me: Did they actually follow that [in the performance the informant worked on]

I: Of course [the director] did. No one was allowed to say Macbeth through the entire rehearsal period leading up to the performance.

Me: Does that go for any show?

I: No, just Macbeth. It was bad luck. I think it was because Macbeth dies in the end. You don’t want Macbeth’s bad luck.

My informant heard this story from the director of the theater department in high school and tells this story because of her interest in theater and theater legends and traditions. This tradition was actually followed in her experience. I think this comes from a long lasting tradition that most directors and actors don’t want to test, therefore they just follow this taboo. No one really knows what will happen if you say Macbeth’s name, but the superstition is so old that I think people are cautious with it just in case.

Washing the gels for the lights practical joke

Nationality: Caucasian, Irish, German, and Bohemian American
Age: 22
Occupation: Graduate Student in Computer Science
Residence: Minneapolis, MN
Performance Date: 3/25/13
Primary Language: English
Language: Japanese, Spanish

My informant worked in theater during her high school and undergraduate years, specializing in lighting and light designs. She worked in the lighting department at her school for quite some time and she shared with me a story about a trick that she would play on new students working on lighting at the theater. The setting was a casual lunch at a restaurant.

Informant: “We would play this joke on anyone new working on the lights for a show. We used gels made out of gelatin to put over the lights to make them different colors. After a show, they get burnt from the light, so you ask the new kid to go wash them with soap and water. But the gels would disintegrate in the water because they were made out of gelatin! Then they would come back looking all concerned and worried like, “I destroyed them!” And I would just sit there like “Ha-ha-ha.”

Me: Did anyone ever play this trick on you?

Informant: Nope, but I played it on people all the time. It was so funny. Now, gels are not made out of gelatin as commonly so the joke can’t be played anymore.

This story is an example of occupational folklore because only the experienced technical theater workers would know this trick. My informant repeats this because it is funny for her and her coworkers. She also said that it has an element of initiation because once a new person is fooled by this trick, they are then more accepted and assimilated into the group. Once they know about the joke, they can then play it on other new people as a way of showing that they are now more experienced.

The “Playoff Beard”

Nationality: Caucasian
Age: 39
Occupation: Business Analyst
Residence: Wayzata, MN
Performance Date: 3/20/13
Primary Language: English

My informant was a competitive hockey player his entire adolescence and was raised in Elk River Minnesota, a hockey powerhouse. He played Division 1 hockey until an injury caused him to transfer schools where he played Division 3 hockey. His father has been a prominent boys hockey coach and local legend in the state of Minnesota for 26 years.

The “playoff beard” is a tradition that hockey players do where they stop shaving when they enter the play-offs and do not shave again until the team is out of the tournament (or wins). Which results in the stereotypical scruff, mustaches, goatees, or out of control hair seen in hockey players. The playoff beard is a unique practice of the National Hockey League during the Stanley Cup playoffs but has spread to being performed in high school and NCAA teams. My informant participated in this tradition during his time as a hockey player, and noted its importance to the hockey community. My informant said that that they do it “because of superstition.” The tradition started in the 1980s by the New York Islanders, and has grown to be a trademark of hockey.

From personal experience, I have witnessed my high school’s hockey team grow out their facial hair and refuse haircuts when the state tournament came around. Upon my own research, I found that some teams do it to have a sense of team unity. An example of this is seen when the University of Minnesota men’s hockey team all bleached their hair blonde in the 2006-07 post-season. A high school tennis team all gave themselves Mohawks for their trip to the state tournament as well. The growing of hair and beards has been seen in other sports such as tennis, basketball, and football in high school teams or individual athletes. It has also spread to philanthropic organizations such as “Beard-A-Thon” that raises money for each team in the Stanley Cup’s charity, and to the development of the “fan beard,” where fans grow beards to support their team.

Smorum (Bohemian Breakfast)

Nationality: Bohemian, 1/4 German
Age: 74
Occupation: Accountant
Residence: Benson, MN
Performance Date: 3/19/13
Primary Language: English

Smorum is a pancake like breakfast dish that my grandpa has cooked for me and my cousins since we can remember. It is a flour based, pancake like breakfast dish. It is his signature dish, and every time any of his grandkids are staying at his house, you can find him in the kitchen at 8am making smorum. I know of no one outside of my family that has ever heard of smorum. I remember in first grade we had to do a project on a family tradition and I did mine on smorum and couldn’t find the correct spelling anywhere because it was only passed down by the performance. It is unclear how to even pronounce or spell the word. My grandpa makes it so much that he doesn’t even use a recipe at all, he knows how much to put in of everything and makes it the same very time even though his measurements might not be exact. The context of this collection is the same as my entries about the world’s smallest church and James McCone except this collection took place in the kitchen as I watched my informant prepare the breakfast. The best way I can describe the process is that it was very casual. He cracked some eggs, tossed some flour loosely into measuring cups and poured it into his big mixing bowl and let it stir while he talked to me. He poured out the mix into a frying pan so it took up the entire pan. After a few minutes he flipped the smorum up in the air, caught it in the man and allowed it to cook the other side. He cuts it into little squares with his spatula, walks over to the kitchen table, and pours the steaming smorum into the big glass bowl sitting on the table. This performance is tradition in our family. Not only is how my grandfather cooks the meal important, but the set up of the table, and how the food is presented to us is tradition. The large white, glass bowl contains the fresh hot smorum, the little tea plates are set out to eat the smorum, and old plastic cups are used to drink either the grape or orange juice that is already set on the table as well. Smorum is always served with syrup, usually homemade by my grandmother.

Story:

Grandpa: “We always had shmudum for breakfast! Poor people’s breakfast. We never had cereal you know in our day. We just made shmudum.

Rebecca: What are the origins of shmudum?

Grandpa: Well in the Spillville cookbook it is spelled smorum, but that’s not how I pronounce it, so I don’t know.

Rebecca: How do you spell it?

Grandpa: S-m-o-r-u-m.

Rebecca: But that’s not how you spell it?

Grandpa: I would have spelled it shmudum. But I couldn’t find the recipe anywhere, I can’t find the spelling anywhere…So I don’t know.

Rebecca: So where did you learn to make it?

Grandpa: From the Spillville Church Cookbook

Rebecca: didn’t you learn it from your mother?

Grandpa: I never knew how my mother made it.

Rebecca: So your mother made it for you?

Grandpa: Yep. She made it for me every morning

Rebecca: what made you want to make it then?

Grandpa: because I tried to once at our house and the grandkids just loved it. And it was a whole lot cheaper than cereal. When we were in Jacksonville (FL) last month, Kenny made it one morning and it was very good. Just like I made it

Rebecca: I heard Kenny is good at it, but its hard to make it just like you. My dad burns it every time. Its not the same if you don’t make it

Rebecca: do you know where your mother learned to make it?

Grandpa: From her mother probably. I’m sure that was handed down for 10 generations or more.

Rebecca: From where? Is that Bohemian?

Grandpa: You know, I thought it was Bohemian but I’m not so sure if it wasn’t German. But I call it Bohemian. You know the Germans infiltrated Bohemia at that point on the border. About 1/3 of Bohemia was German. My dad was Bohemian and my mother was German. Well my mother was both, Bohemiam and German. So I never knew for sure where anything came from. But I always call it Bohemian. And whatever I call, wasn’t anybody going to dispute. (laughter). Because nobody has… support.

My informant learned this dish from his mother, and ate it growing up. It has developed into a huge tradition in my family, and we don’t go a family get together without having smorum in the morning, and my family gets together quite often. It also amazes me how smorum never gets old, no matter how many times I have had it. Smorum is also something that my father and my uncles have tried, but no one can quite make it like my grandfather does. He cooks it just the right amount without burning it, which is often what happened when my father tried to make it. The performance has been adapted since my great grandmother made smorum for my grandfather. My grandfather adapted his performance for the grandchildren. As a grandchild, smorum is very important to me and is an association I make with my grandfather. My grandfather performs it as a sentiment to his childhood, but also for his grandchildren. He continues on the legacy of what his mother made, but adapted it to be a treat for the grandchildren. Smorum started out as a cheap and easy breakfast on the farm, but now is a unique thing that my family all shares.