Category Archives: Legends

Narratives about belief.

Irish Pub Joke

Nationality: American
Age: 23
Occupation: Student
Residence: Los Angeles, CA
Performance Date: April 30th, 2013
Primary Language: English
Language: French

“So my family’s Irish and so my dad knows a bunch of Irish shit that he brushed up on when we went to Ireland. So he told this joke to a lot of people in Ireland. And it’s:

An American walks into a bar in somewhere in Ireland and sits next to a really old guy drinking a beer. And the old guy’s like, “Did you see that wall on your way into town?” And the guy’s like, “Yeah.” And the old man’s like, “I built that wall with my own two hands. But do they call me O’Grady the Mason? Noooo.” Then he’s like, “Did you see those cabinets on your way into the bar?” And the guy’s like, “Yeah.” And the old man’s like, “I build those cabinets with me own two hands. But do they call me O’Grady the Carpenter? Noooo.” Then he says, “Did you see the iron gates on the way into town?” And the guy’s like, “Yeah.” And the old man’s like, “I built those gates with me own two hands. But do they call me O’Grady the Smith? Noooo. But you fuck one goat…”

The informant told me this joke in an Irish accent. He was excited when he remembered the joke, because it’s one of his favorites. I think he likes being part Irish (he said that his great-grandfather came here from Ireland), so this joke reminds him of his heritage. It also reminds him of his trip to Ireland last year, of which he has fond memories. Furthermore, the joke is a little dirty, so as a 23 year old, the informant understands and appreciates the more mature humor. I quote, “It’s fucking hilarious”. The informant learned the joke from his father, who learned it in an attempt to reconnect with his Irish heritage. Folklore can form powerful ties when it comes to heritage, ethnicity, and nationalism. Learning and understanding the jokes of a culture can make someone feel a closer connection with that culture, because humor is often culture-specific. Thus, both the informant and his father use this joke to feel more Irish.

I have met many people who are proud of their “Irish heritage”, even though they weren’t born in Ireland and may never have even been there. I think it’s more common when those people’s parents have also been proud of the link to Ireland, so they grew up hearing about their Irish heritage. So it makes sense that both the informant and his father feel this connection to Ireland and therefore love the joke. I found the joke funny, although I didn’t get it right away. I’m not Irish at all, so that could have something to do with it. The joke mentions various jobs that the Irish hold, including mason, carpenter, and smith. There jobs all involve manual labor and skilled hands. It reflects a big part of the economy in Ireland, as least before industrialization. The Irish would mainly work with their hands for money, because that’s what the culture and geographical constraints pushed them to. The joke also mentions a goat, because goats are common on Irish farms, and the people there interact with more often than here in LA for example. It’s funny that the old man had sex with a goat because it’s weird, which is half of why the joke is successful. The other half is because of the repetition of the pattern three times, a magic number in western culture. Overall, I think the joke is amusing.

Camp Lore: Lemonade Tower

Nationality: Eastern European Jew
Age: 15
Occupation: Student
Residence: Calabasas, California
Performance Date: March 17, 2013
Primary Language: English
Language: None

Informant: “Every year at camp Kinneret, the camp counselors bring all the campers up to the lemonade tower and give them lemonade from the mermaids who live in the tower.”

 

The informant is currently a freshman in high school and lives in Calabasas, a particularly wooded area for Southern California. The informant recollected this experience from when he was a younger child attending Camp Kinneret, a summer day camp for children aged 4 -14, during the summer. The informant was approximately five years of age when he learned of this legend from his camp counselor.

According to the informant, at some point every summer the camp counselors will take the children enrolled in the camp on a hike to a nearby water tower, give them lemonade, and tell them the story of the tower. The legend was that mermaids lived in the tower and had made the lemonade for the campers who visited them. The purpose of the legend, according to the informant, was that “kids get lemonade and it gets the kids to be excited to be at a camp where there are mermaids who can make lemonade.” When asked how the informant felt about the lore he said that as a child he did believe in the mermaids and that he “thought it was awesome that mermaids were giving me lemonade.”

In the camp, this legend is age graded because as those who attended the camp got older they no longer believed in the mermaids who lived in the tower, but the informant said the counselors would tell them “not to spoil the story for the younger kids.”

I agree with the informant that this legend is a great way to get campers excited to be at camp, especially because the legend is focused on younger members, around four to six, who might be afraid to be away at a camp.

Popular Haunted House Hang Out

Nationality: Mexican, Scandinavian, French Canadian
Age: 18
Occupation: Student
Residence: Beaumont, California
Performance Date: March 28, 2013
Primary Language: English
Language: Spanish

Interview Clip

Informant: “There is like this oak tree that everybody goes to party at and then there is this burnt down house next to it and it is just these steps and I think the legend goes that this lady just like went crazy and burned the house down and killed her husband”

Interviewer: “Do you know who she was?”

Informant: “I don’t know, its just this circulating legend.”

 

The informant comes from a very small town in California. The informant states that “there is nothing to do there, it is just a small town and the biggest thing we have is a Walmart.” She said that because the town is small “everybody knows each other, and we kind of grew up together.”

The informant has lived in this town since childhood. The informant says she may have heard of this legend in elementary school and that this legend is widely known throughout the town, “everybody in out town knows it. Young people circulate the story, I don’t know if older people do or not.”

The informant stated that visiting this house is a relatively popular event. Adolescents sometimes “have parties there,” and go there to hang out. Personally, the informant has only been there a few times just to check it out, but “I know people that actually go up there and actually drink and whatnot and smoke because there is not really much to do.”

The informant thinks the house is considered to be haunted by the other people in town, and the informant does believe in ghosts. When asked, the informant recalled her personal experience with a ghost saying that “the house I grew up in until I was seven was definitely haunted, I saw his ghosts multiple times, and it wasn’t just me, my parents saw him. We would go to bed with all of the windows and doors shut and we would wake up and they would all be wide open, you would hear banging on the pipes and whatnot. We found out that the person who lived there before us died in the house. So the ghost was of the guy that died there.” Thus, ghosts are very real to the informant.

For the informant and others who visit the house, the house serves as a kind of legend quest to visit a site that is considered to be haunted. During the interview, the informant stressed that she felt the town she came from was very small so people were looking for things to do and places to hang out. This house has been adopted to fill that role.

Ghost Story: Smoking in the Boiler Room

Nationality: Scandinavian
Age: 19
Occupation: Student
Residence: Omaha, Nebraska
Performance Date: March 28, 2013
Primary Language: English
Language: None

Informant: “Millard North High school in Omaha, Nebraska is haunted with the spirit of a kid who was smoking one day in the boiler room. Now, I didn’t even know we had a boiler room but apparently it’s over by the wood shop. Uh, in that hallway. So, this kid was smoking in the boiler room and um a custodian started to walk down the hallway and frightened the kid uh turned around and tried to run away tripped and stumbled down the stairs, hit is head a few too many times and now when you walk past that hallway or walk into the basement, which again I didn’t really know we had a basement, but you can hear the kid’s raspy voice telling you to beware.”

The informant, a Caucasian male, was born in Spokane,Washington and then moved to Omaha. He is currently a student at USC and studies computer science.

The informant heard the story from someone at his high school. He remembers this story because he feels that “ghost stories are always more fun when they have some sort of significance to you, like you have ties to that school, for example, or if it’s in your home town.” According to the informant, the story is not “too frequently passed around,” and he is not sure if anyone at the school truly believes it, or just repeats the story as a joke.

The informant does not believe in ghosts personally, he thinks the story is kind of silly. In fact, the informant stated, “honestly, I’m not even sure if we have a basement.” The informant said that some kids at the school “fall for all of the ghost stories,” but “in many schools there will be some kids who believe that sort of thing.” The informant referred to one friend in particular who believes in ghosts about whom the informant said “I mess with him a lot and he thinks I am entirely serious.” It is possible that this story is circulated as a joke and to “mess with” students who may believe it, but the informant does not think so.

The informant says that “the moral was no smoking in the basement,” and I agree with the informant. Although the story may be used to jest about the paranormal, it ultimately discusses the illegal consumption of marijuana at a school, and the result is death. The student who broke the law is now forced to haunt the hall and warn other students not to make the same mistake. Like other legends, this tale reflects social fears and concerns about the consequences of consuming illegal drugs, breaking the law, and breaking the law on school property.

Krampus: Addendum

Nationality: Cuban, Hungarian
Age: 49
Occupation: Homemaker
Residence: Woodland Hills, California
Performance Date: March 20, 2013
Primary Language: English
Language: Some Hungarian

Informant: The Krampus, well the Krampus is a beast-like creature that looks like a devil but with horns and satyr like feet and a really long tongue. He is from the Alpine countries and is related to St. Nicholas day where he follows St. Nicholas around. He punishes naughty children by putting sticks in the shoes they leave out for St. Nicholas, or  even worse he will kidnap naughty children, stuff them in his bag, and steal them away to hell, never to be seen again.

 

The informant is a middle aged mother of two older children. She is a first generation American who was born in Danbury, Connecticut. Her father was born in Oriente, Cuba and her mother was born in Mór, Hungary. The informant and her sisters were told of the Krampus from their mother when they were teenagers. Although the informant does not believe in the Krampus herself, the informant’s mother did. As a child, the informant’s mother would put her shoes out on the Eve of St. Nicholas’s Day, December 5th. On St. Nicholas’s Day, December 6th, is it said that the Krampus would accompany Santa Claus, also known as St. Nicholas. St. Nicholas would put candy and sweets in the shoes of the children who were well-behaved and the Krampus would put sticks and twigs in the shoes of the children who had been naughty. It was also thought that the Krampus would abduct really misbehaved children and take them away to hell.

The informant remembers the tales of the Krampus because she felt it was “funny and creepy at the same time.” The informant felt that Germanic, Hungarian parenting could be very punitive, and still kept “the old-fashioned belief that you can scare children into behaving.”

Although other entires have already discussed the Krampus, they label the Krampus as German folklore. I think it is important to stress that this is not entirely the case, the legend of the Krampus has spread to other countries around Germany like Hungary as the informant who described the Krampus to me is of Hungarian origin. In fact, the legend of the Krampus comes from the folklore of Alpine countries, not solely Germany.

According to the informant, in many countries like Austria, Southern Bavaria, Hungary, Slovenia, Croatia, and the Czech Republic, young men dress up as the Krampus and roam the streets frightening children with rusty chains and bells. Also, the informant said that the Krampus is “featured on holiday cards called Krampuskarten.” (Below are some examples of Krampuskarten)

 

    

The Krampus also appears as the subject of a novels such as:

Brom, Gerald. Krampus: The Yule Lord. New York: Harper Voyager, 2012. Print.

And even makes an appearance in the Colbert Report:

“Sign Off – Goodnight With Krampus.” The Colbert Report. Comedy Central. Wednesday December 9, 2009. Television.