Talk:Folklore of the United States/Archive 1

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Archive 1

More tall tales

This article should be linked (if not merged with) The article on tall tales (let the Australian section be a seporate article). - Kevingarcia 08:36, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

So I picked up a travel map, sponsored by ENCO a "humble oil & refining company: America's Leading Energy Company" circa 1960, called "Happy Motoring. Travel maps were popular during the days of the road trip family vacations of the post WWII era (coinciding with the popularity of Route 66). It lists 62 folktales and legends ranging from Paul Bunyan to the Menehune of Hawaii. It also has several tales not mentioned here. Some include:

- Barney Beal a lobsterman of Main with arms so long and strong he could lift a half-ton anchor.
- Bowleg Bill (see Slue-Foot Sue), a cowboy who rode giant fish in the ocean, but was disappointed by how easily they could be tamed.
- Gib Morgan, an oilman that built a derrick so high he had to henge it to let the moon pass by and so deep he had to send a 20-block-long boa to retrieve dropped tools.
- Joe Magarac, an Industrial Revolution era robot that worked day and night. The map attributes this to Hungarian immigrants. (This character has an existing stub)
- "A knee-high man consulted people and all the animals on how to grow bigger. Finally a wise old owl told him: 'All you need is a bigger brain.'" (I have no idea what this refers to, but it's a Southern tale, possibly from Alabama. Sound familiar to anyone?)
- Steamboat Bill (unrelated to Captain Chesapeake), who tried to be the record set by the steamboat Robert E. Lee. A song was written about him.
- Frank McDarmit, a giant Paul Bunyan-type who could harvest an acre at a time.
- Febold Feboldson, the farmer who discovered popcorn during a drought.
- "In Kansas they tell the story of a farmer's son who climbed a stalk of corn to inspect the top ears. The corn grows so fast and so tall there, that the farmer had to send up a balloon to bring the boy back to earth." (Another one I'd like to know more about, if it sounds familiar to anyone).
- Frances Ella "Fizzy" Fitz, an apparently real person known for her storytelling skills (described as similar to Mark Twain or Abe Lincoln in reputation).
- Swiss John, one-armed (and one-hooked) frontiersman who defended his sheep from lynxes (bare-hooked) but was belittled by cattlemen.
- Sam McGee, a frozen Southerner who wakes up right before his cremation.
- Deadwood Dick Clark, a dime-novel cowboy.
- Finn MacCool in an Americanized tale.
- Daniel Webster in a mythic version of The Devil and Daniel Webster .

Each of these figures deserve entries in Wikipedia, but I don't have much more than this map to go by. More tall tales can be found at this website: http://inquiryunlimited.org/lit/ttalesbks.html - Kevingarcia 08:36, 28 January 2006 (UTC)

Native Americans not men and women?

Wow, has anyone else noticed that Native Americans are separated from "Historical Men" and "Historical Women"? I was just going to move them into the appropriate male and female categories, but this page really needs a whole new conceptualization. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.123.62.217 (talk) 00:21, 19 September 2008 (UTC)

Re-organization

I am going to attempt a massive reorganization. BillyJack193 (talk) 02:43, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

I plan to do more later, but for now I am done. I reorganized all of the lists of people by combining the males and females and further categorizing them as well as adding many whom I felt were missing from the list. Really, that particular section could be broken up into a separate article.BillyJack193 (talk) 05:30, 14 February 2010 (UTC)

Titles

Why in the world is everything AMERICAN, such as AMERICAN FOLKLORE, on pages titled ______ of the United States? It should be titled as its name: AMERICAN FOLKLORE! —Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.22.246.142 (talk) 15:18, 8 March 2010 (UTC)

I'm sorry...

Jesse Ventura is a part of American folklore? Are you joking? He's in the same list as Thomas Jefferson? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 164.106.46.56 (talk) 16:57, 24 March 2010 (UTC)

Well, the article needs massive cleanup that's for sure. But in this particular case, I can see it because he's a wrestler who became a governor. As they say, only in America.BillyJack193 (talk) 01:51, 25 March 2010 (UTC)

Yes, Many Problems Here

At first I just noticed that "Apocryphal People" included Casey Jones - a verifiable historic figure AND Zorro - a fictional character created by an author. Then I noticed how most of the "article" is just lists of many people who don't have anything to do with American folklore. —Preceding unsigned Comment added by --Ergonaut2001 (talk) 17:04, 10 May 2010 (UTC)

Totally agree. However, there are certain people from each category who may belong. we need to reach a consensus on who those people may be.BillyJack193 (talk) 00:35, 12 May 2010 (UTC)

Columbus: get it straight

First, Columbus discovering America is not a falsity-implied "pervasive story". He truly did discover America. Yes, it was unintentional; yes, there were Native Americans there; yes, the Norse did it first. The fact remains that the Europeans did not know about America and that they learned about it from Columbus. "Discovery" simply means finding out about something you didn't know--you could discover your keys in the refrigerator, even if the Norse had seen them there first. And what is this about "immigrants from all walks of life"? It sounds like someone was reading their Political Correctness textbook, not their history textbook. They were explorers or colonists, not immigrants. Immigrants are those who integrate themselves into another nation. The only independent nations in America until 1776 were Native American tribes and confederations, and Europeans didn't integrate themselves into those, they colonized. So, please, let's get the facts straight.--Jtle515 (talk) 16:54, 29 July 2010 (UTC)

Currently, this article is awful

Isn't there anyone out there interested in writing a serious article about American folklore? There's not much content here right now -- and that intro paragraph is just plain nonsense. A major expansion is needed -- I hope a knowledgeable person will take a crack at writing a worthwhile article. --Kevin Myers June 28, 2005 04:58 (UTC)

I tend to agree. The opening paragraph still reeks of po-mo condescension. This may be a fruitful candidate for an article improvement drive.
Might want to begin with a section about sources: Native American, British Isles, African-American folklore, immigrant beliefs, contemporary legends. Individual articles could then be pulled from the long list of subtopics and discussed in text instead. Smerdis of Tlön — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ihcoyc (talk • contribs) 15:12, 28 June 2005 (UTC)

Need Assistance

I am in a high school summer school class, and we were doing research from this page, and my friend thought it would be funny to edit the section under "tall men and their tall tales", "Most mythic" and "Most realistic" and write a ridiculous note. I was able to recover the "Most mythic" section, however, I wasn't able to recover the "Most realistic". I request that someone who knows this field best come and reconstruct this part of the page. I am very sorry about the loss. A student — Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.184.109.253 (talk • contribs) 14:02, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

What about Non-American people important to American mythos? What about fictional characters part of American identity?

Surely Osama bin Laden has become highly mythologized in American culture. Or rather, demonized. He is basically the modern-day Satan/bogeyman. What about mascots like Ronald McDonald? McDonald's is perhaps America's most iconic and largest fast food chain in existence and IIRC Ronald is just as famous as Pikachu as an icon. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.227.159.150 (talk • contribs) 09:07, 8 August 2011 (UTC)

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Oz

Why is the Wizard of Oz included here? It is not a folktale. Manannan67 (talk) 02:41, 19 June 2020 (UTC)

Agreed. I've removed it. Woodroar (talk) 17:41, 23 June 2020 (UTC)

Folklore definition differs from WPs

This article is very different from other countrys' folklore articles, it looks like to justify the content Wakelamp d[@-@]b (talk) 12:47, 31 May 2022 (UTC)

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