Author Archives: William Hiller

Don’t Wear Pearls On Your Wedding Day

Nationality: American
Age: 70s
Residence: NC
Performance Date: 2011
Primary Language: English

My informant for this story is my friend’s grandmother.

As I mentioned in another post, my best friend got married last year.  Prior to that experience, in which I served as best man, my experience with weddings was very limited, so I did not know much about them or what went on at them or any superstitions surrounding them.  One such thing about which I had never previously heard was a piece of folklore that warned against the bride wearing pearls on her wedding day.  I asked my informant what the reasons for this lesson was and she was unsure of its origin or exactly what it meant.  All she knew was that everyone in her family had always said it to any brides in on close to the family and they all said that wearing pearls on your wedding day would bring tears, presumably in the marriage.

I don’t think my friend’s wife ever planned to wear pearls at the wedding, but I am sure that if she had thought about doing so, the convictions with which her husband’s grandmother warned against wearing pearls, she would have chosen not to.  This, in my opinion, is a good example of a piece of folklore or superstition that has an unknown or little known origin that despite that fact, guides the decisions of people that have heard it so often.

If It Rains On Your Wedding Day

Nationality: American
Age: 53
Residence: NC
Performance Date: 2011
Primary Language: English

My informant for this story is my friend’s mother.

Last year, my best friend got married.  He married a girl he had been dating for almost 5 years and I was glad that she is very nice and friendly, which allows me not only to continue my friendship with him without changing, but also continue and build a friendship with his wife.  Since we have been friends for so long, he asked me to be his best man.  Of course, I accepted.  In the days prior to the wedding, we all set up for the ceremony and the reception.  On the morning of the wedding, we began setting up for that evening’s reception, which was to take place outside, when we were dismayed to see that it was almost certainly going to rain.

Needless to say, we had to change our plans and move the reception indoors.  Logistically, this was quite a challenge and so we spent the entire day up to just an hour before the wedding finishing the tasks necessary to accommodate this change.  Sure enough, it did rain very hard for a long time that day.  This caused some new challenges for the wedding itself and for my friend’s wife, trying desperately not to ruin her wedding dress.  At the reception after the wedding, we talked for a long time about the wedding and many different things.  At one point, my friend’s mother said that if it rained on your wedding day, it meant you would have a good marriage.  I had never heard this before and I think we were all tired from all the changes and hearing this sort of let us all take comfort in this fact and hope for it to be true.

Always Cut the End of the Ham Off Before You Cook It

Nationality: American
Age: 70s
Residence: NC
Performance Date: 2002
Primary Language: English

My informant for this story is my friend’s grandmother.

My friend’s grandmother is a great cook.  She would often cook for us and going over to her house for a meal was one of my favorite things to do.  She would cook many different things.  On special occasions, she would cook a large ham, if there were going to be enough people there to eat it.  Almost every time she would cook a ham, either she or someone else in the family would remind her or ask her if she had cut the end off of the ham before cooking it.  This was sort of a running joke and I never thought much of it until after one meal, she was discussing the origin of the saying.  She had said that her husband’s mother, who taught her many of the recipes she still practices, had always told her to cut the end off the ham prior to cooking it.

It was years later before she realized that the reason they always said this was because they never had a pan big enough to accommodate cooking a ham with the end intact.  To this day, she laughs about this, having not known the reason for so many years.  She also mentioned it so many times to my friend and to me that I often think about this anytime I have ham or on holidays or other special occasions where a ham is being cooked.

Don’t Go Barefoot Before May 1st

Nationality: American
Age: 70s
Residence: NC
Performance Date: 2001
Primary Language: English

My informant for this story is my friend’s grandmother.

When I was younger, I would spend the night at my friend’s house fairly often.  His house was where all of us would hang out and play video games or watch movies.  For some reason, we didn’t spread out going to all of our houses very much.  Since we were at his house so often, we often were there when his grandparents were over at the same time.  As a result, I got to know them pretty well and developed a friendship with each of his grandparents.  One time, when I was spending the night at his house, I went downstairs to the kitchen to get a drink.  It was in March.  I remember it because we were watching March Madness on TV.  I came downstairs barefoot and as I walked to the kitchen, I hear his grandmother say “don’t you know you’re not supposed to go barefoot before May 1st?”

She said it in a friendly and joking way, so I sort of laughed it off but as I thought about it, I wondered what she meant.  I didn’t say anything at the time but at a later date, I asked her what she meant and she explained that her husband’s family always warned against going barefoot before May 1st.  She explained that they took it very seriously and forbade their children from doing so and it was evidently because generations earlier, one of the children in the family went barefoot to the outhouse.  Though it was spring, it was still very chilly and the child caught a cold, developed pneumonia and died.  I was surprised to hear this was the reason, but I often think about that as I am walking around the house barefoot.

Joe College

Nationality: American
Age: 25
Residence: NC
Performance Date: 2000
Primary Language: English

My informant for this story is my friend.

In his family, dating back to his grandparents, though they were fairly poor and grew up during the Depression and were economically impacted, many members of the family went to college.  This was somewhat unique for the time period, specifically for the region and time they lived in.  Furthermore, many of the children went on not just to college or higher education, but to attain several degrees or terminal degrees.

Accordingly, it became sort of a rite of passage for each sibling to begin their college career and make the visits back home and participate in the other typical collegiate activities.  As each one got closer to go to college and was accepted, all the members of the family would start to call him “Joe College.”  My friend’s grandfather said he was never sure where the term originated or who first started saying it, but he was the oldest of his generation within the family and when he got towards the end of high school and was accepted into college, his parents, grandparents and his siblings began calling him “Joe College.”  It became something that each one went through, again, like a rite of passage.  When he had his own children, he did the same, as did each of his siblings and I remember when my friend got accepted to college, his grandfather called him “Joe College.”  I never knew why or what it meant exactly until I researched it for this assignment.