Beard of the Week LXIII: Beard Clubs
This week's beard belongs, by proxy, to Santa Claus. The proxies in this instance are members of the Amalgamated Order of Real Bearded Santas.* (Photo source: David Haldane, "Bearded Santas let their hair down at lunch", Los Angeles Times, 21 January 2008).
Surprisingly, this is a group I'd not heard of before. I say surprisingly because, when one enjoys hanging out with bears of the human kind (think large, gay men with beards), one is likely to rub elbows with people who find seasonal employment as a "real-bearded" Santa. Indeed, we were once acquainted with one such and have also known at least one other who contemplated going to santa school (who knew?).
The story accompanying this photograph is about the group's annual founders' luncheon and describes the origins of the group. It's a chance for santa-helpers with real beards to network and share professional tips.
They also provide a reliable topic for feature writers at newspapers at this time of year. The LA Times article mentioned above describes a civilized luncheon attended by some 150 real-bearded santas. But what's this? In July (Tom Leonard, "American Santas plunged into civil war", The Telegraph [UK], 11 July 2008) we hear talk of upset and division:
Organisers of the annual convention in Kansas of the Amalgamated Order of Real-Bearded Santas, fear it will be disrupted by splitters from rival groups such as the Fraternal Order and the Red Suit Society.
The trouble started last year with a row on the board of the Amalgamated Santas, a 700-member group which was set up in 1994 by 10 Santas doing a television commercial in Hollywood.
Apparently the possible schism was set off just after the founders' luncheon reported on earlier. News evidently develops quickly in the world of real-bearded santas. I haven't heard of any new developments lately, but my ear may not be close enough to the rooftops to notice. Time will tell, I suppose.
This is a busy time of year for some of us real-bearded non-santas, particularly Isaac, the real-bearded church musician. I'm a Christmas-Eve widow since Isaac disappears about 5pm on that day in order to bring off an evening of three entirely different services with three entirely different musical programs plus an interlude before the middle service provided by festively outfitted hand-bell ringers playing some light-hearted Christmas favorites. I usually stay at home to cook while he exhausts himself, then we meet at friends' house for a little midnight supper, where we try to stay awake until 1 or 2 am.
Thinking of real-bearded groups, my mind wandered back to a dinner some 15 years ago. The occasion was the 1993 March on Washington (for Gay/Lesbian/Bisexual/Transgendered equality), an event for which many online acquaintances were going to be in town. (A number of them stayed at our house–in College Park, at the time–which was quite fun.)
Anyway, I organized a dinner evening for friends from the Bears' Mailing List, an online virtual group of bears (see above) and like-minded people. About three dozen were to attend the dinner, enough that we had our own portion of the private dining room of the chosen restaurant. Picture the three dozen gay men, all with beards of varying extravagance (not to mention a few nose piercings) with an average weight of, say, 275 pounds, looking to normal suburbanites rather like a bunch of bikers. (The look may be similar, but the attitude is not.)
The last person to arrive reported that the hostess spotted him immediately.
"Oh," she said, "you must be with that group of men in the back. What are you, some sort of beard club?"
His answer: "Close enough."
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* This group's name is an excellent example of an instance where a hyphen in the multi-word modifier would clarify their nominative intention nicely: Real Bearded-Santas or Real-Bearded Santas? Probably the latter, but I wouldn't want to just to judgment.
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on Wednesday, 24 December 2008 at 02.34
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Squabbling Santas — what next? Brings to mind (hazily) a long-ago news brief about a couple of Santas, one for a department store, another for a charity, that got into some kind of turf battle. I don't recall all the details, but I think one of them either had or was in danger of having a black eye by the time the cops arrived to settle them down.
I hope you and Isaac have a thoroughly enjoyable Christmas holiday, and can stay awake to the wee hours.
on Wednesday, 18 February 2009 at 16.05
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I don't think they need a hyphen. If the hyphen was added it would indicate a lean toward the non belief of Santa….and let's face it, these guys believe.
But do you have to be gay to be a real bearded Santa….I hope not, my wife will be sorely disappointed!!!
on Wednesday, 18 February 2009 at 22.38
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I don't know whether I agree, Tim, but I also think it's not a terribly powerful problem, the hyphen. To my eye, putting the hyphen in "real-bearded Santas" binds the "real" and the "bearded" tightly together, so that we can be more certain that it is the beard that is denoted as "real" rather than the Santa (else it might be "bearded real-Santas").
There seems to be no expectation that I know of that one be gay to be real bearded Santa, so please don't upset your wife with that news! It's not surprising that I might know some real-bearded Santas who are; I might expect you to know many who are not, since we move in different circles. Now, because I'm gay and because I am generally attracted to men with beards (i.e., bears) and frequently enjoy their company, beard groups that I know may tend towards the gay, but I don't think there's anything generally regarded as gay about a beard these days, on Santas or otherwise, and some are decidedly mixed (for example) and celebrate that.