For most of America, May Day has grown old and gray; it ain't what it used to be.
Except in Mendon, Utah.In Mendon, May Day springs eternal.
"On May Day our population can go from 630 to 2,500," says Mayor Earl Doolittle. "The first Saturday in May has become a major part of our heritage."
This year the celebration falls on May 2. Festivities begin at 10 a.m. sharp (as always). They end with a bang that evening (as always). And in between, the rites, rituals and customs haven't changed a whit since 1872.
The founder of Mendon - Isaac Sorensen - started it all. He wanted to bring a touch of old Denmark to a new, untamed territory. Today the "old country" remains alive and well.
Amid all the Wild West celebrations (Founder's Day in Wellsville, Festival of the American West in Logan) the Mendon celebration has a genteel, courtly feel. Mendon's celebration, in fact, feels more like a slice of Elizabethan England than an American holiday. It features May poles, a May Queen, a queen's court, crown bearers, flower girls, male consorts and a general atmosphere of "Maying."
And the songs the town sings sound like tunes a troubadour might compose on a lute. They include "Come to the Woodland" and "Welcome You, Queen of May," and these lines from theever-popular "Straying and Maying:"
With cheerful glee and chorus song
the hours were filled with pleasure,
some found a pebble, some a flower;
each trifle seemed a treasure;
For trifles light as air can please
the guileless heart in hours of ease.
"My father implanted those songs in me, and his father implanted them in him," says T. Kay Sorensen, Mendon's Mr. May Day. "When my father was dying he told me to memorize the tunes and routines and keep them alive. I've done that. The songs are very special to us here. We even used to practice them during church."
More than one song is a tribute to the newly crowned queen and her chosen "consort." To keep the queen's name secret, the chorus sings the name "Lily" during practices. The queen must be a junior in high school. A hundred years ago she also had to come from a family with enough money to throw a feed for the town, though in recent years the city has taken over the responsibility.
Once the queen is named (her name is drawn from a hat), she must chose her court and her male escort for the coronation.
This year the honor of queen goes to 17-year-old Katie Krebs.
"And it is an honor," she says. "Especially for me. My grandmother Marie was May Queen in 1942 - exactly 50 years ago."
Needless to say, everyone in Mendon has a favorite May Day memory or two. Former Mayor Ross Shelton remembers the year it snowed. Some recall the girls wearing paper dresses during the Great Depression. And Doolittle tells of a time when a shortage of young girls meant the boys had to dance the May pole.
As for Sorensen, he recalls the year when the boys decided singing lines like "The merry maids a Maying went" was sissy stuff and boycotted the whole affair ("Bunch of smart alecs," huffs Sorensen today. "They didn't feel it was `manly.' ")
"Still," adds Doolittle, "we've only missed one year out of 120. That was the year small pox hit town and people were prohibited from congregating."
And the word is this year's fest will be as bright and light as ever. For the first time in memory, Sorensen - Mr. May Day - is not handling the details. At 82 he passes the baton along to Sandy Austin, an energetic young Mendon mother who is organizing the day.
Sorensen steps down with a word of caution, however: "The celebration was begun because the settlers here liked the idea of welcoming spring after all the drudgery and mud of winter," he says. "I hope the future organizers are as wise as a tree full of owls and make sure the young people get involved and keep track of our traditions."
The truth is there's not much chance of them falling away. In Mendon, the more things change, the more they stay the same. For instance, back in the '20s Mozella Sorensen - then 12 - was named queen. She chose her "good friend and neighbor," 13-year-old Owen Sorensen, as her consort. Today the couple's been married for more than 50 years.
This year, Queen Katie Krebs chose Mark Shelton to escort her. Says Mark: "Katie and I are just good friends and neighbors."
Uh-huh. But it isn't May Day yet. And everyone in Mendon knows how May Day works wonders with the human heart.