Prove me wrong

[bluegargantua]

Hey,

American folklore focuses primarily on The Heroic Individual. We've got the lone guy out on the frontier making it safe for civilized society.

But we never really have A Heroic Group. We've got a lot of Hercules and Gilgamesh type stories, but we don't have an Argonautica or Kalevala. Every now and again we get a "Team-Up" episode where Paul Bunyan and Pecos Bill get together or Davy Crockett and Mink Fink face off, but we don't really have a well-known story where a whole bunch of larger than life characters get together and go do stuff for awhile.

Can anyone think of some counter-examples?

[EDIT: I'm not counting comic books/TV/Movies/Mass Media. Not that those aren't necessarily valid, just not within the perview of my question. I'm thinking here of oral storytelling. If it's not something you can use freely without the threat of copywright infringement, then it probably isn't what I'm trying to get at.

SIDE NOTE: But considering comic books for a minute, the interesting thing about them is that they've really only got one story -- the origin story. Everyone knows how Superman, Batman, Spiderman, et. al. got their start. And they can usually describe their primary villian, but actual events beyond the creation of the hero become much more muddy. You might remember specific issues, but it almost never translates into a larger consciousness. The common man knows that Spider-man loves Mary Jane but only comic geeks know that before MJ, Spidey let a certain Gwen Stacy fall to her death.]

later
Tom

Comments

[jeregenest.livejournal.com]

JLA. Star Wars/Star Trek fanfiction.

Seriously the Argonautika was nothing more than the JLA. Itsa let get a bunch of cool guys together with their own stories and go do cool stuff to justify another story!

[gower.livejournal.com]

The Magnificent Seven?

Star Trek and all other related Sci Fi?

[invader-haywire.livejournal.com]

You beat me to Mad 7... I raise you Wyatt Earp and crew

[invader-haywire.livejournal.com]

Untouchables

[bluegargantua]

Yeah, that's a pretty good one.

[kadath.livejournal.com]

What's the cutoff between folklore and modern storytelling for you?

[woodwardiocom.livejournal.com]

-In relatively recent myth, we have a fair amount of it. The JLA, the Fantastic Four.

-In older folklore, how about the Founding Fathers?

(Okay, the fact that the Fantastic Four and the Founding Fathers have the same initials is inspiring a truly demented bit of pastiche in the spirit of SuperLBJ . . . )

[owlsamantha.livejournal.com]

Hmm..I also want to know where it is that folklore ends and modern storytelling begins in this timeline because my first thought was, "comic books?"

[mazianni.livejournal.com]

Frank and Jesse James. Real life outlaws, but ISTR there were a number of Robin Hood-esque folk tales about them.

Most of what I can remember though are stories about Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill, John Henry, Johnny Appleseed, Coyote, Raven, Rabbit, etc.
All stories about individuals.

[jhim.livejournal.com]

Keep in mind, even the Argonautica is mostly about an individual (Jason) and his loyal crew, as oppose to a group who are each larger than life.

But you have a good point... the power of the individual is a vital aspect of Americana.

Star Trek is the good example, but it's modern. And it can be argued that it is based on the seafaring mythos of maritime and wartime, some of which are derivative of the Argos and the Odyssey. Moby Dick may actually be a better example.

Star Wars is directly derivative of the folklore of other cultures, but it can be argued that the themes it invokes are universal. But again, modern.

JLA I don't think fits the bill, as it is actually more of a team up/cross-over of established heroes (see your Pecos Bill/Paul Bunyan example.

The Magnificent Seven... isn't that based on The Seven Samurai?

If you eliminate modern examples, where there is more room from cross-cultural contamination, to me the only real example in Americana folklore where a group of larger than life characters perform heroic deeds, it would be the Founding Fathers.

Oh! Oh! What about the MORMONS?

OH! Oh!

[bluegargantua]

Yeah, Mormons are really a group of people and not a "task group" per se. Actually, the inspiration for Dogs in the Vineyard came from a small group of Mormons who protected the fledging Utah colony (mainly by killing every non-Mormon who stumbled across them, but that's not an unusual pattern for Americans).

In the same vein, 49-ers, Dust-bowlers, migrant workers, etc. would all be a group, but there it gets a bit too diffuse. You can't point to any one 49-er, you just get generalized stories about them.

later
Tom

[desiringsubject.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry, but you can *certainly* point to at least one 49-er.

"Dwelt a miner, 49er,
And his daughter, Clementine..."

Not really mythic group heroism, but, certainly a notable example.

[jhim.livejournal.com]

Uhm... Jesus?

[bluegargantua]

"Jesus was a cross-hangin' man..."

Tom

[desiringsubject.livejournal.com]

What was the battle that The Charge of the Light Brigade was based on? Oh whoops. British.

I think there were a couple revolutionary war battles that were focused on the group that battled. Lexington/Concord?

Yeah, I'd actually agree with jhim about the Mormons. Certainly in their own ideology, but also, what was it... Study in Scarlet? The first Sherlock Holmes...

The Quakers, too, came as a group and thought Fox and Fell and later Penn got names (and a state!) they were very much a "group."

Not to even mention the Mayflower puritans themselves.

Summer of Love-ers?

I'll note as I'm trying to answer this that I have no idea who "Argonautica or Kalevala" are. Oh, duh, okay, the first is the Argonauts. Sheesh, raise something to an abstract noun and I go all floopy.

Speaking of ships: the USS Constitution?

Gold rushers?

[quiet-elegance.livejournal.com]

The lone hero. Iteresting observation. Truth is that in reality most *heros* are the ones who lead. Getting others to follow into thier bravery. Current movies, "The Great Escape", "Band of Brothers", "Saving Private Ryan". i wouldn't call any of these folklore, but they are becoming, and have, a mythos surrounding them.

[invader-haywire.livejournal.com]

To add/be more specific to your post...

Anything about Easy Company, Big Red 1, 1st Air Cav...

[quiet-elegance.livejournal.com]

Yup you got it.

Sports Teams

[bluegargantua]

Sure Babe Ruth was a Individual Hero, but the Yankees are a Legend.

Vince Lombardy is the Leader, but the Green Bay Packers (under his rule) were a Legend.

Sports teams aren't quite as mythic as Paul Bunyan and company, but for their fans, they're in the same ballpark.

later
Tom

Re: Sports Teams

[dirkcjelli.livejournal.com]

Aren't those groups "individuals" as far as the story is concerned? I mean... the Argonauts refers to a laundry list of nameable heroic personages... the Yankees are faceless men in identical uniforms who share certain stereotyped traits (clean cut, willing to pay to win... I'm not looking to quibble on these details).

I mean... you can replace Yankees/championship in the following with King Arthur/grail and get a reasonable thing. "The Yankees fought all season, and were faced with many challenges in their attempt to secure the championship... [details, origin, etc]"

I'm trying to say... it is the same kind of storytelling, with a plural group proper noun instead of a singular proper noun...

Re: Sports Teams

[bluegargantua]

True, but it's a group of individuals.

I don't follow sports, but I do know that people are passionate about winning years when they had a "team" of individual greats.

So yeah, Coach Arthur and the Red Sox win the championship, but it's the quest of Right Fielder Lancelot, and Pitcher Gallahad that make up that quest.

later
Tom

[kadath.livejournal.com]

Brian and I beat this to death over lunch. We concluded that you have two schools of group heroic storytelling: Trapped on a Boat, and Not Trapped on a Boat. Trapped on a Boat storytelling covers those stories where Our Heroes are forced to stick together by circumstance, resulting in an ensemble story, from the Argonauts to WWII to Star Trek to X-Men. Not Trapped on a Boat storytelling is that in which the characters all do their own thing, and periodically get together at the Round Table Smoking Club to discuss their exploits, like Arthurian tales, the Founding Fathers, the great pulp crossovers, etc.

[bluegargantua]

I declare this metaphor to be the winner.

And since America is a landlocked country, there's no boat to get trapped in. Explaining the high frequency of Not In A Boat stories in American folklore.

Tom

[brainiac69.livejournal.com]

Lewis & Clark (with Sacagawea and Charbonneau)?

[mikecap.livejournal.com]

Texas Rangers, like knights, but interestingly they bred a Lone Ranger myth.

American Revolution. Ben Franklin, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson et al are a group of larger than life folks who band up and do stuff.

Edison, Ford, Firestone, and their crew. They were inventors who were also friends and teamed up to industrialize the country.

[robotnik.livejournal.com]

The Founding Fathers (which a few people have pointed to) are a pretty good answer. But I think you're right about the classic American tall tale. For one thing, many of the stories about Paul Bunyan, Pecos Bill, etc. are the same stories just adapted to whichever regional hero you're talking about.

Team-ups between folks like Bunyan and Ben Franklin and Pecos Bill are like cross-over comic books: the heroes pound the crap out of each other for a while when they first meet, then team up to defeat a genuine foe.

[shiffer.livejournal.com]

Image: Paul Bunyan and Ben Franklin meet, pound the crap out of each other for a while, and then team up to defeat... The British?

criteria; American, folklore, group and not mentioned yet...

[hawkhandsaw.livejournal.com]

Pinkertons, Longhunters, Santo Patricios (sp?), The SeaBees, also Mason and Dixon, though really more of a duo like Lewis and Clark then a group like the others.

[twwombat.livejournal.com]

What about war stories? How many legends are made of specific companies of soldiers doing deeds above and beyond the call? How about the Minutemen in Lexington and Concord or the Boston Massacre? Iwo Jima and The Battle of the Bulge (soldiers with no food, no shoes, and no ammo holding a town in 10 below weather for a week against several companies of Panzers) spring to mind, and I'm sure there are similar tales of derring-do for every conflict ever. Especially if they make a specific group look good...

"From the halls of Montezuma to the shores of Tripoli" - Marines have made their own legends. I also seem to remember "The Ballad of the Green Berets" playing on a jukebox for set assembly in Alden.

Granted, these are all "Stuck on a Boat" style stories, but the difference is soldiers are all doing a job they =expected= to do and were =trained= to do rather than being ripped out of their normal experience and screwed by fate. I don't think the Founding Fathers woke up one morning and said, "Today we're gonna make a nation." They were pushed too far for years and didn't see any other options from their colonial "boat". In fact, we'd probably be speaking the Queen's English today if George had backed off on the taxes a bit.