My earliest memory of a May Day celebration, was at Deepstep Grammar School. The grades of 1-5 came up with the brilliant idea of celebrating with a “May Pole Dance.” A tall pole was placed on the playground with colored streamers attached at the top. We practiced for the celebration to be held later that week on, well, May Day. The idea was to create a colorful weave of the streamers as we students weaved in and out of each other’s path.

The idea was something akin to a strange amalgam of a Jewish wedding dance and a Square Dance Do-se-do. Ours didn’t even come close to a Maypole dance.! The teachers finally gave up after the streamers were knotted, destroyed, or wasted. (We students managed to hide our delight!) We still had the picnic, though.

According to The Old Farmers’ Almanac, May Day has an interesting and colorful history: As with many early holidays, May Day was rooted in agriculture. Springtime festivities filled with song and dance celebrated the sown fields starting to sprout. Cattle were driven to pasture, special bonfires were lit, and the doors of houses and livestock were decorated with yellow May flowers. In the Middle Ages, the Gaelic people celebrated the festival of Beltane, which means “Day of Fire.” People created large bonfires and danced at night to celebrate. 

May Day is not a national holiday, but according to Britannica, Labor Day, which is a national holiday, has its roots in May Day Celebrations, The Hay Market Affair in Chicago was a brutal event which initated International Workers’ Day ce;ebrated on May 1.  President Grover Cleveland, uneasy about the accociation with Spcoa;osts. moved the celebrationof workers to the first Monday in September, calling it Labor Day. It preserved a recogntion of workers while dodging the danger of rioting workers.

But I digress. According to Britannica, Maypole dances often occur on May 1. The Maypole dance,  which we unsuccessfully attempted at Deepstep Grammar school, is a ceremonial folk dance performed around a tall pole garlanded with greenery or flowers and often hung with ribbons that are woven into complex patterns by the dancers. Such dances are survivals of ancient dances around a living tree as part of spring rites to ensure fertility. Typically performed on May Day (May 1), they also occur at midsummer in Scandinavia and at other festivals elsewhere. 

©Copyright Willis H. Moore 2026