 | |
| Abbreviation | CdR |
|---|---|
| Formation | 1830 |
| Type | Mystic Society |
| Location |
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The Cowbellion de Rakin Society was the first formally organized and masked mystic society in the United States to celebrate with a pedestrian parade in 1830. [1]
| | |
| Abbreviation | CdR |
|---|---|
| Formation | 1830 |
| Type | Mystic Society |
| Location |
|
The Cowbellion de Rakin Society was the first formally organized and masked mystic society in the United States to celebrate with a pedestrian parade in 1830. [1]
The Cowbellions got their start when a young merchant and cotton factor from Pennsylvania, Michael Krafft, began a parade with rakes, hoes, and cowbells. [2] The Cowbellions introduced horse-drawn floats to the parades in 1840 with a parade entitled, "Heathen Gods and Goddesses. [3] [4]
1837 account of the Cowbellion celebrations of Christmas and New Year.
Mobile is a city and the county seat of Mobile County, Alabama, United States. The population was 187,041 at the 2020 census. After a successful vote to annex areas west of the city limits in July 2023, Mobile's population increased to 204,689 residents, making it the second-most populous city in Alabama, after Huntsville. Mobile is the principal municipality of the Mobile metropolitan area, a region of 430,197 residents composed of Mobile and Washington counties; it is the third-largest metropolitan area in the state.
Mardi Gras is the final day of Carnival ; it thus falls on the day before the beginning of Lent on Ash Wednesday. Mardi Gras is French for "Fat Tuesday", reflecting the practice of the last night of consuming rich, fatty foods in preparation for the Christian fasting season of Lent, during which the consumption of such foods is avoided.
A krewe is a social organization that stages parades and/or balls for the Carnival season. The term is best known for its association with Mardi Gras celebrations in New Orleans, but is also used in other Carnival celebrations throughout Louisiana and along the Gulf of Mexico, such as the Gasparilla Pirate Festival in Tampa, Florida, Springtime Tallahassee, and Krewe of Amalee in DeLand, Florida with the Mardi Gras on Mainstreet Parade as well as in La Crosse, Wisconsin and at the Saint Paul Winter Carnival.
The Mistick Krewe of Comus (MKC), founded in 1856, is the oldest extant New Orleans, Louisiana Carnival Krewe, the longest to continually parade with few interruptions from 1856 to 1991, and continues to hold a tableau ball for its members and guests, to date. Initially its public facade was The Pickwick Club.
A Moon Pie is an American snack, popular across much of the United States, which consists of two round Graham crackers, with marshmallow filling in the center, dipped in a flavored coating. The snack is often associated with the cuisine of the American South, where they are traditionally accompanied by an RC Cola. Today, MoonPies are made by Chattanooga Bakery, Inc., in Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Joseph Stillwell Cain Jr. was an American Confederate military veteran largely credited with initiating the modern way of observing Mardi Gras and its celebrations in Mobile, Alabama, following the Civil War.
The Mardi Gras mystic society of Cain’s Merry Widows was founded in 1974 in Mobile, Alabama, home of the first Mardi Gras in America (1703). The organization celebrates 50 years in 2024. Each Mardi Gras, The ladies, known variously as "The Merry Widows of Joe Cain", "Joe Cain's Widows", or even just as "The Widows" gather on Joe Cain Day, clothed in black mourning clothes with veils, to lay a wreath at Cain’s burial site at Church Street Graveyard, wail over their "departed husband's" grave, then travel to Joe Cain’s former house on Augusta Street to offer a toast and eulogy to their "Beloved Joe".
Mardi Gras refers to events of the Carnival celebrations, beginning on or after Epiphany, and culminating on the day before Ash Wednesday.
The Striker's Independent Society (SIS) is the oldest continuously active mystic society in Mobile, founded in 1843, Alabama. Mobile's Mardi Gras history spans over 300 years, as customs changed with the ruling nations: Mobile was the capital of French Louisiana in 1702, then British in 1763, then Spanish in 1780, entered the Republic of Alabama, was declared American in 1812, a U.S. state in 1819, then Confederate in 1860, then became American again in 1865 and participated in Carnival during New Year's Eve and New Year's Day celebrations. It is the oldest remaining mystic society in America but no longer hosts an annual parade.
Mardi Gras is the annual Carnival celebration in Mobile, Alabama. It is the oldest official Carnival celebration in the United States, started by Frenchman Nicholas Langlois in 1703 when Mobile was the capital of Louisiana. Although today New Orleans and South Louisiana celebrations are much more widely known for all the current traditions such as masked balls, parades, floats and throws were first created there. From Mobile being the first capital of French Louisiana (1702), the festival began as a French Catholic tradition. Mardi Gras has now evolved into a mainstream multi-week celebration across the spectrum of cultures, becoming school holidays for the final Monday and Tuesday, regardless of religious affiliation.
Mardi Gras throws are strings of beads, doubloons, cups, or other trinkets passed out or thrown from the floats for Mardi Gras celebrations, particularly in New Orleans, the Mobile, Alabama, and parades throughout the Gulf Coast of the United States, to spectators lining the streets. The "gaudy plastic jewelry, toys, and other mementos [are] tossed to the crowds from parading floats". The 'throws', consist of necklaces of plastic beads, coins called doubloons, which are stamped with krewes' logos, parade themes and the year, plus an array of plastic cups and toys such as Frisbees, figurines and LED trinkets. The plastic cups that are used as throws are sometimes referred to as New Orleans dinnerware.
A mystic society is a Mardi Gras social organization in Mobile, Alabama, that presents parades and/or balls for the enjoyment of its members, guests, and the public. The New Orleans Krewe is patterned after Mobile's Mystics. The societies have been based in class, economic and racial groups. Mobile's parading mystic societies build colorful Carnival floats and create costumes around each year's themes.
The Mobile Carnival Museum is a history museum that chronicles over 300 years of Carnival and Mardi Gras in Mobile, Alabama. The museum is housed in the historic Bernstein-Bush mansion on Government Street in downtown Mobile.
The Order of Myths is a 2008 documentary film directed by Margaret Brown. It focuses on the Mardi Gras celebrations in Mobile, Alabama, the oldest in the United States. It reveals the separate mystic societies established and maintained by Black and White groups, and acknowledges the complex racial history of a city with a slaveholding past.
Mardi Gras in the United States is celebrated in a number of cities and regions in the country. Most of these places trace their Mardi Gras celebrations to French, Spanish, and other Catholic colonial influences on the settlements over their history.
The Order of Myths, (OOMs) founded in 1867, is the second oldest mystic society to celebrate Mardi Gras in Mobile, Alabama, after the Striker's Independent Society. It is the oldest continuously parading mystic society in Mobile. The Order of Myths chose, as its symbolic emblem, Folly chasing Death around a broken column of life. During parades, a person dressed in a jester's suit, as Folly, chases a person dressed in a skeleton suit as Death, around a Greek column on the emblem float. At the conclusion of the traditional OOM parade, Death is defeated, and Folly wins the day.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Mobile, Alabama, USA.
The Twelfth Night Revelers (TNR), founded in 1870, is a New Orleans, Louisiana, Carnival Krewe. It is the second oldest continuous organization of New Orleans Carnival festivities.
The Athelstan Club, formerly The Athelstan Masonic Temple, is a private gentlemen's club in Mobile, Alabama, US, founded in 1873, tracing its roots to a Masonic lodge established in 1870. By 1875 it had loosened membership to non-Masons and in 1876 formerly became The Athelstan Club. It admittedly admitted its first African American Member in 2011.
The Manassas Club was a gentlemen's club in Mobile, Alabama, founded in 1861.