By Dan Beard
Novelties for Crockett's Day
How to Run a Costume Race, a Leap-Frog Race, a Wheel-Barrow Race, and a Push-Wagon Race
We have learned how to celebrate Appleseed Johnny's Day, Kenton's Day, Audubon's Day, and now we are ready to celebrate Davy Crockett's Day.
The gay, rollicking, absolutely fearless Davy Crockett was born on August 17, 1786, and this will make a splendid Midsummer Field Day for the Sons of Daniel Boone. A celebration of this kind, to be successful, requires considerable preparation and training. It is none too early to begin a month or two ahead of the date.
Invite any neighboring Forts to meet with you on that day, or on the half-holiday nearest to that day, to engage in pioneer field sports. If there are no Forts close at hand with which to compete, invite some of the local athletic or school organizations to meet you and compete for a championship in a pioneer game. In order that you shall have a most entertaining time, your Founder has adapted a unique lot of the pioneer sports for you to use upon that date.
If there was one peculiarity about the old frontiersmen, it was their ability to do things and do them on the jump. They were good at the hundred-yard dash and the long-distance run, and some of them, like the Wetzel brothers, could load and fire and reload their awkward, long-barrelled, flint-lock rifles while they were on a dead run pursued by savages. We want the modern Sons of Daniel Boone to be as quick as their forebears in thought and action, and the Dressing Race is a test of this sort of ability.
Fig. 225.
Getting into Their Shirts in Costume Race
Measure off a course of three hundred yards for the racetrack; have a starting line, and a very distinct line at the first hundred yards drawn across the track, another distinct line at the second hundred yards drawn across the track, and before the race let each contestant spread his wammus out flat on the ground at the first hundred-yard line.
If the contestants have no Boone uniform, and consequently no hunting tunic, they can use flannel shirts for this occasion, and spread them out, back downward and arms extended, along the line marked on the track (Fig. 225). The shirts should be placed in the same relative position that the racers occupy at the starting line. Under each shirt, at the waist, spread out a leather buckled belt.
Fig. 226.
Approaching the Hat Line-Costume Race
At the second hundred yard line let each contestant place his hat (Fig. 226). The third hundred-yard line is the finish. The racers start with their running clothes on at the report of a starter's pistol. When they reach the first hundred yards each racer must seize his own wammus, or shirt (Fig. 225), put it on, button it up, put on the belt, and buckle it before he reaches the second hundred yards, or, properly speaking, before he leaves the first hundred-yard mark. Then he dashes away for his hat at the second hundred-yard line, grabs that, and puts it on his head, then tears away to beat his opponents at the finish line. To win in this race the contestant must cross the line with his shirt buttoned up to the neck and at the cuffs, his belt buckled around the waist, and his own hat on his head.
There will be all sorts of fun and laughable incidents in this contest, and it will keep the spectators in a merry mood for some time.
It is foul to interfere with each other while running or dressing, or to kick or misplace one's opponents' shirts, belts, or hats. There must be a judge at the start, a judge at the shirt line, another at the hat line, and a judge at the finish, to see that the race is conducted fairly.
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