The May Pole dance: Merrie England at the Macdonald Institute

The sun shone down brightly on the greensward. A double line of young women, dressed in white gowns and carrying wildflowers, fresh boughs, and staffs proceeded onto the field. With a rope, they marked out the regal circle and prepared for the arrival of the Queen. The May Pole, the trunk of a tree chosen specially for the occasion, was brought forth and erected in the middle of the space. The girls formed an aisle and the Queen emerged, carrying her hallowed boughs, followed by her maids of honour, and processed to her throne, there to be crowned and preside over the day's festivities.

("The graduating class", featuring the May Queen on her throne with her entourage. OAC Review, v. 23 n. 11, July 1911, p. 570)

The time was 4:30pm on 26 May 1911 and the place of this seemingly pagan ritual was the campus of the Macdonald Institute, just outside of Guelph, Ontario. On the face of it, it seems odd that an archaic, medieval ceremony should be undertaken in Edwardian Guelph. Indeed, the reasons for it are not altogether clear. Yet, the ritual does seem to represent an effort to bring a greater sense of Englishness to the young women at the Institute just outside the Royal City.

As explained by Anne Bloomfield (2001), the May Pole dance was originally part of the May Day festivities practiced in medieval England, as well as much of the rest of Europe. In the springtime, a pole was selected and cut from a nearby forest, trimmed, decorated, and erected on a special site. A May Queen was crowned and festivities, including many dances, were enjoyed.

Celebration of May Day was forbidden by royal edict in 1644, perhaps to appease Puritans during the English Civil War (McDermott 1859, p. 12). Although the edict was repealed with the Restoration of 1660, May Day did not return to its former popularity.

However, May Day festivities were revived during the Victorian era. In Britain and all over Europe, increasing industrialization and urbanization were accompanied by nostalgic attitudes towards lifestyles of the medieval and renaissance eras. Combined with growing nationalism, one result was increasing interest in rural folk culture, including folk music, dances, and celebrations. True Englishness, it was thought, could be found in these elements of times gone by.

In the course of the 19th century, more and more English cities began to revive—or introduce—May Day festivals. They began to compete with each other to attract more visitors and tourists. For example, Knutsford became noted for its May Day celebrations and remains so today. Eventually, many such festivals dried up as their market share shrank or people's interests changed.

May Day festivities also become integrated into public education. In particular, the influential public intellectual John Ruskin incorporated the celebrations into his teacher training curriculum. He felt that May Day rituals and dances inculcated British youth with a proper sense of their heritage from the rose-tinted "Merrie England" of yore. However, like many revivalists, he did not balk at modifying traditions to suit contemporary tastes. For example, instead of the usual, very tall May Pole with decorations attached to the top, Ruskin promoted a shorter pole with ribbons hung from the top that could be woven into patterns by dancers. In fact, this sort of pole and dance may have originated in Italy. In any event, Ruskin thought it comely and his influence ensured that this version of the pole became widespread.

In Britain, May Day celebrations continued to be promoted to children during the Edwardian era, when the Macdonald Institute was created. There is very little discussion of the importation of May Day festivals into Canada but it seems likely that it arrived here along with the many British immigrants of the time.

It is unclear what caused the festival to be introduced at the Macdonald Institute in 1910. Snell (2003, pp. 50–51) notes that the ceremony was chosen by the Macdonald students themselves as a fitting representation of their values on graduation, apparently cultivation and femininity as these qualities were then understood. Ross & Crowley (1999, pp. 96–97) describe the proceedings as follows:

A queen was chosen, the Macdonald gymnasium decorated profusely in flowers assembled from around the campus, and young women attired in dainty white frocks. Twenty maidens entered the gym carrying brown and gold shepherds’ crooks adorned with buttercups. They then formed an arch through which the other students, carrying flowers, entered. The May pole bearers came next. When the queen entered surrounded by her maids of honour, she knelt to receive her crown from principal Mary Urie Watson before ascending to her throne on a specially constructed stage adorned with foliage. Once the pole had been decorated and dancing was finished, president Creelman and the May queen led the way for the planting of the graduation tree. Tea on the lawn followed, with an evening program that included Victrola selections and fireworks to cap off a perfect student planned performance.

Sounds like good fun!

The event was a hit and it was decided to hold another one the following year. This time, photographers were on hand in force. The 1911 May Day fete was fulsomely described in the OAC Review (v. 23, n. 10, pp. 570–572). The author notes that the event was held not on May first, as in England, but on May 26, because the greater length of Canadian winters precluded the appropriate activities until a later and warmer time of the month. The proceedings are described as follows:

At 4:30 o’clock, on May Day, the Macdonald girls in dainty white frocks all assembled in the gymnasium and after forming in a line two they marched out to the campus where the events were to occur. First came about twenty of the girls each carrying a brown and gold shepherd’s crook and butter cups. The crooks were joined together at the right distance by a slender rope which when each girl took her proper place, marked off a large space on the green for the dances and crowning of the Queen. Then came the rest of the Juniors carrying blossom covered boughs and wildflowers. Following these came the May Pole bearers, who carried out, and placed in position the May Pole. The girls formed in a long double line through which the Queen was to pass followed by her maids of honor.

The postcard below is a real-photo card (a photograph printed on postcard stock) showing the Juniors emerging from the gymnasium of the Macdonald Hall to take their places within the rope enclosure.

Then, the ceremony continues:

Two tiny tots—dainty little flower-girls—led the way strewing the path to the platform with blossoms. How sweetly gracious and stately looked the Queen as she went to her crowning followed by two train bearers! The Queen took her place, her maids of honor grouped about her and she knelt to receive the crown [Macdonald Institute Principal] Miss Watson placed on her queenly head.

The picture below shows the flower girls leading the May Queen from the gymnasium and into the regal enclosure, followed by her train bearers.

The Queen's name is give as "Miss Wink Frank", a byname that I am unable to decipher. It would be interesting to know her real name.

The next photograph shows the Queen, duly crowned, seated on her throne and attended by the maids of honor and her flower girls. Note that this photograph is identical to the one printed in the OAC Review above, conforming that these pictures are of the 1911 event.

Then came the dances:

After the May Pole had been decorated and the several dainty dances were finished, [OAC] President Creelman and the May Queen led the way to the spot chosen for the planting of the 1911 graduation tree, and the time-honored class ceremony was performed.

The pictures below are of these dainty dances around the May Pole. The OAC Review names two of the dances, the "Rheilander" and the Pole Dance.

The most obvious feature of the "Rheilander" is that it is danced in pairs and does not involve direct interaction with the May pole.

I assume that "Rheilander" is a misspelling of "Rheinlander", which is a 19th century German polka. However, the postures of the dancers shown in the pictures suggest something more like the "May pole minuet" depicted in some of Barbara Irwin's postcards of Edwardian, American maypole dances.

Then there is the May Pole dance, which seems to involve each dancer holding a ribbon and weaving a pattern through their dance.

Since the dancers seems to be going in opposite directions and dodging in and out, this dance is likely a version of the Plait, in which the dancers weave their ribbons into a fabric against the pole. Here is a modern rendition:

After this, tea was served by the Housekeeping class, accompanied by speeches, songs, and tunes on the Victrola. After dark, fireworks were again launched from atop the Institute, courtesy of President Creelman. The assembled then went into the gymnasium of the Hall for the remainder of the evening.

It is interesting to note how the May Day fete was an entirely feminine affair. Traditional May Day festivities included men, particularly as mummers and in sword dances. However, masculine education in Edwardian Canada had been largely militarized by this time, so that young men were more involved with marching, camping, and, of course, playing football. Thus, it made sense to all to hold a May Day fete involving only the young women of the Institute.

Although the May Day celebrations were a hit at the the time, they did not persist. Snell (2003, p. 113) notes that the occasion was superseded by the Daisy Chain graduation ceremony in the 1920s, although a May Pole dance remained a part of this event into the 1930s. Perhaps the onset of the Jazz age and the rigors of the Depression made this slice of Merrie England seem out of place.

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In case you are keen to see more postcards of maypole dances, then point your browser to the late Barbara Irwin collection site.

Let's not forget that the City of Guelph held its own May Day events in the 1920s, featuring Miss Vida Brill as the May Queen in 1922!

If you are keen to stage a genuine, early 20th Century May Day event of the type conducted at the Macdonald Institute, there are many manuals from that era to consult. Here is one to start:

• Lincoln, JEC (1926). "Festival book: May-Day pastime and the May Pole," New York: AS Barnes & Co.
  

Personalizing postcards: X marks the spot

Picture postcards were introduced in the Edwardian era as souvenirs and as collectors items. Yet, as often happens with popular products, consumers soon found new uses for these cards. In particular, postcards often showed images of significant local buildings, such as churches, court houses, and schools. In Guelph, many postcards showed images of the Ontario Agricultural College (OAC) and the Macdonald Institute and Hall. These cards could be sent away to show off Guelph's interesting structures or to please collectors of images in those categories.

However, postcards could also be modified to convey extra information relevant to the sender and the addressee. Anyone who collects Guelph postcards will soon notice that more than a few are marked by their senders with an "X" at a place of special significance. For example, consider the following card of the then-new Macdonald Institute and Hall, produced by Charles Nelles:

The sender, Miss Margaret Smith, has put an "X" beside a third-storey room in the middle of the top picture with the notation, "X is my room" underneath. Beside the pictures, in her meticulous handwriting, Margaret adds, "My address is Macdonald Hall, Guelph." On the reverse, she writes:

Dear Uncle:—This is a picture of our home and school. Hope you are all well, poor Carolyn is having sick time in Toronto. Lovingly, Margaret Smith.

The postmark shows that the card was mailed on 30 May 1906.

Of course, the modification is a simple one. Still, it changes what was a generic image meant for mass consumption into a personal representation, specially meaningful to Margaret and her uncle at an important time. Her stay at the Macdonald Institute may well have been Margaret's first prolonged time away from home, in a place where she would learn how to run a household of her own.

Besides their accommodations, young women at the Institute used postcards to indicate where they conducted their studies. The card below is typical:

Three Xs hover determinedly over rooms of the building. On the back, their significance is explained in the accompanying message:

Dear Auntie,—I am feeling fine and we all are. The places which I have marked are the places where we have domestic science. G.B. from G.H.

No doubt, the postcard was selected because it provided a vantage of the rooms G.B. had her classes in. It was sent in 24 Feb 1908.

The young men at the OAC were no less interested in communicating where they lived and worked on campus. One student, whose initials appear to be CTA, sent this card to his friend Keith to keep him up on current events.

In the message, we learn about the writer's academic progress and his attitude towards marriage:

O.A.C. 30/14 // Dear Keith—Mighty glad to get your card. better use multiplication table & make it a letter. I pulled turnips about as big around as a foot ball one afternoon this week. Haven’t got my false head yet. Have been doing lots of studying lately. Hear Bert Milliken is married also Russ. Feel awful sorry for them. CTA (??) I live in room X.

Careful examination of the picture shows an "X" in the third-storey window just to the left of the central mass of the Main Building (since replaced by Johnston Hall). The card is postmarked 30 October 1914.

As did the young women of the Institute, the young men of the OAC used postcards to show where they did their learning. In the card below, young R. Harris shows his Auntie Alice where he takes his dairy classes:

Four windows on the upper floor are marked with Xs while four below are marked with asterisks, as R. explains:

Dairy School 13/2/08 // Dear Aunt. // Your card received & here is one in return. I wish I could get some more pictures of the Dairy Buildings. This is the Main building with Dairy Class room up stairs with X on windows. Creamery & Butter Making Dept. downstairs marked "*" on windows. Hope you are both well. R. Harris

The Dairy Department had several structures on campus of which this "Dairy Building" was the main one (since demolished). It was indeed the only dairy edifice to be shown on commercial postcards of the era. The postcard was postmarked on 14 February 1908.

Other buildings were occasionally marked with Xs by their occupants. For example, N.N. sent a postcard of the new Macdonald Consolidated School to Miss Barbour of St. Marys, Ontario:

Instead of Xs, N.N. has used brackets and "My room" to indicate the first-floor classroom south of the main entrance, facing out onto Dundas Road (now Gordon Street). The Consolidated School was part of an attempt to improve rural education, sponsored by Sir William Macdonald, by concentrating rural students to central locations where they would have access to better facilities and teachers than were usually available in one-room schools. Assuming N.N. is a girl, she would have learned skills in cooking, sewing, nursing, and gardening in addition to the three Rs. Her room also had an excellent view of the lane next to the school where the vans would gather after class to take the children home. The card was postmarked on 18 November 1907.

Postcards of the OAC and Macdonald Institute are the ones most frequently modified in this way by consumers. This is likely because these institutions had a high turnover of occupants, many of whom wanted to inform their friends and relations about where they were off to school. However, postcards of other places were sometimes given similar treatment. For example, here is a postcard of the Opera House block in which Xs flag a couple of places of business.

The message explains:

Aug. 31/12 Hello Nellie:—This is where I am spending the holiday. Received your kind letter and will answer when I get back. The places marked x are my brother-in-law’s stores. Hope you are keeping fruit (??). Will

Interestingly, the Xs point to the Opera House Pharmacy, operated by Frederick Bogardus, the subject of an earlier blog post. The postcard was postmarked on 31 August 1912.

Since Frederick Bogardus was Will's brother-in-law, we can identify him as Wilfred Henry Hill, brother of Ada Maude Hill, who married Bogardus in 1910. Unfortunately, I have little further information about Mr. Hill to share. I hope he enjoyed spending Labour Day in Guelph!

Picture postcards could seem quite impersonal, the mass-produced ones being generic and disposable. However, people found ways to make these items more personal, such as marking Xs to designate places that were in some way special to them. Among Guelph postcards, these were often cards of the OAC and Macdonald Institute, which the young men and women, newly arrived in Guelph, would mark up to communicate some of the excitement to their friends and relations back home. When looking at old postcards, it is worth paying attention to these little signs for the glimpse they offer into the personal lives of those who put them to use.

The Prince of Wales visits the O.A.C.

The first sentence in the 1919 O.A.C. Review article (v. 32, no. 3, p. 134) puts the matter succinctly: "October the 21st was a red letter day in the history of the College—the Prince of Wales visited us for a couple of hours." Of course, Edward, then Prince of Wales, visited much of the Royal City, including the College, but it was his brief tour of the O.A.C., and Macdonald Hall in particular, that caught the public's attention.

During his extensive tour of Canada in 1919, the future Edward VIII visited many Canadian cities. On October 21, his train pulled into the Grand Trunk Station downtown so that he could make a stop in the Royal City. On his arrival, he was greeted by Mayor James Carter, M.P. Hugh Guthrie, and other civic dignitaries. After a brief inspection of the veteran's honour guard, the party proceeded across the street to a platform at the old City Hall where the Mayor gave a speech of welcome (The Globe, 22 Oct., p. 7).

The main purpose of the Prince's tour of Canada was to thank the nation for its efforts in the Great War and to reaffirm its importance to the Mother Country. These points were the main ones made in his brief reply to the Mayor (Guelph Evening Mercury, 21 Oct. 1919):

Mr. Mayor, I thank you most sincerely for your hearty welcome and loyal address. Your warm expression of attachment to the King and Queen has touched me very much, and I will not fail to convey it to them on my return. Their Majesties have, I know, a very pleasant recollection of their visit to Guelph eighteen years ago.
...
I know that the war services of Guelph were very great, and I wish to congratulate all your citizens, men and women, on their fine contribution to the united effort which has finally given us victory and peace.

There were more speeches, a medal presentation, and a parade up Wyndham St. and Woolwich St., as far as Clark St. Although it was raining, the Prince had the roof of his car left open so that people lining the parade route could see him. However, he did get "soaked to the skin."

Afterward, the Prince was driven through town to the Speedwell Hospital, formerly the "prison farm", where military veterans were recuperating from the war. Following that, His Royal Highness (HRH) went on to the O.A.C.

The remaining pages of the Evening Mercury give the O.A.C. visit barely a mention. However, other papers give pride of place to this part of HRH's visit, especially his interactions with the young women of Macdonald Hall. Arriving at about 11:45, the Prince was treated to luncheon there. The Toronto Star (22 Oct.) provides the most detailed account in an article entitled "Prince won hearts of all Guelph Co-eds":

The fair co-eds at Macdonald Hall, more than 200 of the prettiest and peppiest girls imaginable simply threw themselves at the head of the Prince of Wales on his visit to Guelph Agricultural College yesterday and gave him the most heart-thrilling time of his young male life.

The students sang "Johnny's in Town", a favourite tune of the Prince, and waved "a hurricane" of white handkerchiefs up and down, which was a customary way for women to wave at a parade at the time.

The Prince lunched in the bay window recess of the dining room, the girls greeting him with cheers and standing until he took his place. Six of the very prettiest, who had begged the honour, waited on the Prince's table, trim and chic in blue dresses with white aprons and collars.

After lunch and a dessert of pumpkin pie, the young party went out to the front steps of the Hall and posed for the photographers and "movie men" who accompanied HRH on his tour. At that time, this photograph was taken.

This reproduction is a postcard produced after the tour by British firm, J. Beagles and Co., which specialized in celebrity images. In it can be seen the Prince, holding a cigarette and sporting a flower in his lapel given him by the Mac girls. To the right of him in front stands Mary Watson, principal (dean) of the Macdonald Institute, and in back of him stands Katherine Fuller, the matron of the Hall (Guelph McLaughlin Archives RE1 OAC A0234).

You can see the front steps as they appear today in this image from the University of Guelph campus map:

Everyone appears to be laughing. The cause is the umbrella being held by the young woman in the lower left corner. The Toronto Star describes it in this way:

In the vivacious scramble one girl's umbrella handle got twisted. She was sure the Prince had done it. "I will buy you another," he offered, laughing.
"No, indeed," she replied, pertly. "I'll just keep it as a souvenir."

In his "A picture history of Guelph" (v. 1, p. 12), R.A.M. Stewart gives a slightly different account:

The general merriment was caused by the fact that the end of a cigarette thrown away by the Prince burned a little hole in the umbrella of the maiden on the extreme left, with the result that H.R.H. gallantly desired to replace it.

Stewart's account, along with his reproduction of the same photograph, may come from the front page of the Mercury, now missing from the archives.

Many photographs were taken of the Prince's visit to the city and the O.A.C. However, this image and the story behind it was, by far, the most widely reported and remembered. Why were reporters so keen on relating it?

Perhaps it related well to the general mission of the tour. HRH was in Canada, in part, to reaffirm the old order. During the war, women had assumed a number of roles and occupations previously reserved for men. Afterwards, they were expected to relinquish them to the returning veterans. The Prince's visit to the women's school, with the accompanying emphasis on his virility in contrast to the residents' femininity, symbolized the return of normalcy in gender roles.

It may also be that the visit played into local stereotypes about the Macdonald Institute. James Snell ("Macdonald Institute", 2003, p. 52) notes that many students at the Hall found husbands on campus:

Many of the young women "paired off" with men from the OAC, so much so that by the early 1910s the Mac program, particularly the short program, had already earned the famous nickname, the "diamond ring" course.

The marital reputation of the Hall was ready-made for a news story, with HRH, though unattainable, in the place of the male O.A.C. students.

Certainly, the Mac girls did seem to be star-struck. For example, the young women who waited on HRH in the Hall snatched some unusual souvenirs, including the butt of his cigarette and several unconsumed items of his food such as a piece of celery, a pie crust, and a lump of sugar. As he set out for his campus tour, they trailed after him singing "For he's a jolly good fellow." Later, when he got into his car to leave for the train station, they crowded around begging for his cigarettes (Toronto Star, 22 Oct.):

He took out his case, stuck one in his mouth, and then emptied the whole lot into their outstretched hands. There was much giggling and scrambling for the precious smokes.

You might see similar behaviour at a boy-band concert today!

Mind you, the Prince or his staff had planned for just such a situation. They had prepared souvenir photographs of HRH for distribution to the Hall residents, an example of which can be found in the archives. Either they anticipated the behaviour of the residents, or they wanted to prompt it.

By about 2pm, the Prince had been driven downtown and was on board his train headed for Stratford. The reporters were busy writing up their stories presenting HRH as "Prince Charming" to the pretty girls of the Macdonald Institute. It seems clear that the Mac women were duly impressed. For his part, it seems that the Prince also found the moment a pleasant one (Toronto Globe, 22 Oct.): "The Prince expressed himself pleased at his visit here, and at meeting so many young ladies, the change from meeting so many men being a most agreeable one."

In addition to still photographs like the one in this postcard, there are also several movie reels of the Prince's Canadian tour. Some parts are shown in this video from Library Archive Canada:

Others can be found in segments at British Pathé: Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, and
Part 4. Unfortunately, none of these videos shows HRH in Guelph. Perhaps that reel, if it exists, remains in storage somewhere.