May Day
Down the ages, the first day of May has been a time to celebrate the coming of summer, and to hope for fertility and abundance in the coming year. The Romans had a festival dedicated to Flora, goddess of fruit and flowers, and they decorated their homes with leaves and flowers.
Pastoral festival
The ancient Gaelic festival of Beltane marked the pastoral season, when livestock were driven out to summer grazing lands. On Oidhche Bhealtaine (the eve of Beltane) people lit ritual bonfires on the mountains and hills in the hope that they would herald a good harvest. Today it is still celebrated by Pagans and the customs have been sustained in Scotland and other places with Gaelic traditions.
In the Middle Ages, people living in the English countryside celebrated May Day by cutting down young trees to create maypoles. These were decorated with long ribbons, which the people held as they danced around the pole, plaiting the ribbons into elaborate designs.
Industrial struggle
Today many of the old traditions continue alongside the more recent customs of International Workers' Day. Towards the end of the 19th century in North America, the trades unions demanded an 8-hour day. Many people then – as they still do in many parts of the world – worked desperately hard in dreadful conditions for 10 or 12 hours a day, six days a week.
The struggle culminated in a general strike in Chicago, Illinois, in which the police killed two workers. A protest rally followed at which a bomb was thrown, killing one policeman and wounding more, some fatally. The police opened fire on the crowd and dozens were injured.
Eight people connected with the anarchist organisers of the protest were charged with the murder of the policeman. Though there was no evidence connecting them with the bombing, they were all found guilty and seven were sentenced to death. Several years later the Governor of Illinois concluded that they had all been innocent.
Planting and parades
Since then, May Day has been a time for parades and demonstrations by socialists, communists and anarchists. In the Soviet Union it was an official holiday, marked by military processions, with tanks and weapons displayed in a show of force.
In Britain in recent years the anti-capitalist movement has organised several imaginative and controversial demonstrations in London, one of which involved 'guerrilla gardening' and another of which ended with a statue of Winston Churchill being given a green mohican hairstyle.
