Bochum May Evening Society

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The Maischützen move out to Harpen.
The bachelor captain rides through Harpen, with his entourage behind.
The actor of Count Engelbert III. moves together with the Bochum bachelors and the oak to the monument of Count Engelbert III. past.

The Bochumer Maiabendgesellschaft 1388 is a traditional association in Bochum that was founded in 1948. It organizes the annual Bochum May Evening Festival , which is said to have been held in the Middle Ages by Count Engelbert III. was donated by the Mark because the Bochum citizens had supported him in the great Dortmund feud (1388 to 1389). The current bachelor captain from the bachelor officer corps is Meiko Krämer. Stefan Vahldieck has been chairman of the Bochumer Maiabendgesellschaft since May 2019.

organization

Any “innocent citizen” can become a member. Membership is not tied to the place of residence. Legal persons can also acquire membership. The company is headed by a bachelor captain with a bachelor adjutant, as well as captains for the 4 companies.

Bochum May Evening Festival

The May Evening Festival takes place on the last weekend in April, the ´Evening before May´. The move to Harpen takes place on Saturday.

This main part of the festival takes place as follows (as of 2013): After the collection on the town hall forecourt , the move out through the Beckporte towards Harpen. Here, in the Bockholt , there is a ceremony as well as the excavation of the oak by the bachelor captain and the bachelors. This is carried back on the shoulders of the bachelors. On the way there and back, other party groups join the train; a meeting of all involved takes place on the fairground on the Castroper Straße. After that, the collected parade moves back through the Beckporte into the city and over the Kortumstraße to the monument of Count Engelbert III . From there, the conclusion takes place on the boulevard with a ceremony and the sale of the tree.

History of the May Eve Festival

According to the legend, the Bochumers brought back the Harpen cattle stolen by the Dortmunders because they had promised the Harpen farmers help in the event of an attack. "Boy, do kass di drop lost!" (Boy, you can rely on that) the mayor of Bochum is said to have said to the spokesman for the Harpener and then sent a dozen men on the hunt for the Dortmunders to bring the cattle back. They allegedly succeeded in doing this by means of a ruse, namely by whistling loudly to convince the Dortmunders who were resting in a hut that they were being attacked, whereupon the Dortmunders fled the hut in panic and left the cattle behind. From this legend, both the addition “Boy, you can drop you lose” from the “Bochum boy song” and the whistle at the end of the song come from. Impressed by the courage of the Bochumers, he then allowed the Bochum bachelors to cut down a full-grown oak from the count's woods in the Bockholt district of Harpen on the evening before May 1st . This was then bought by a wealthy Bochum resident and the citizens were supposed to organize a festival.

However, this legend is historically not tenable, as the city of Bochum shows on its website. According to this, this theory comes from the 19th century, while there is no evidence that the May Eve Festival is actually as old as it is claimed. It could also have its origin in another time.

The May Evening Festival was first described by Carl Arnold Kortum in 1790 , even if the cash pension had already been introduced at that time. Older Bochumers told him that in the past a tree could be fetched and sold and that this custom had its origin in the Dortmund feud.

In 1769 the claim to the maypole was canceled by the now Prussian sovereign and replaced by a cash pension. In 1888, however, the "ancient custom" was reintroduced and continues to this day despite some interruptions. The trees that were brought from Harpen to the city area were planted in Bochum's city park until 1995. Bochum companies have been purchasing the tree since 1996. This is then usually planted in the city center and a sticker from the donor is attached to the tree disc.

In 1928 the first wreath- laying took place in the collegiate church Fröndenberg .

In the 1950s, the May Evening Festival was very popular and well attended as a city festival. This was recorded by the city of Bochum in the annual film. For the 600th anniversary in 1988, a large city festival was held with Bochum's twin cities. Representatives from the council and political parties as well as partly from the twin cities regularly take part in the pageant. Since the festival was reorganized in 2010, a fair has been held on the boulevard.

For the 625th anniversary in 2013, two steel panels were inaugurated, which are supposed to symbolize the old city gate "Becktor". This so-called Beckporte has the traditional meaning that the Maischützen must have moved back to Bochum here before sunset. Also in 2013 a small city history museum was inaugurated on Grosse Beckstrasse.

Bachelor captains after the war

Herrmann Möller (1948), Heinz Ostmeier (1949–50), Werner Siepe (1951), Heinz Flake (1952), Willi Hölting (1953–57), Gustav Turowski (1958), Heinrich Herbsthoff (1959), Dieter Borgmann (1960 –61), Heinz Tepel (1962), Jochen Menne (1963), Heinrich Herbsthoff (1964), Günther Pieper (1965–66), Peter Hübner (1967–68), Dirk Kramer (1969), Hans-Jürgen Blum (1970 ), Erich Mansfeld (1971), Heinz-Jürgen in der Beek (1972–76), Ludger Guntermann (1977), Ewald Fischer (1978–81), Ernst-Dieter Ludwig Pfeiffer (1982), Hans-Peter Münnich (1983) , Ernst-Dieter Ludwig Pfeiffer (1984), Norbert Hagenböhmer (1985–88), Rainer Pilarczyk (1989–91), Michael Dröge (1992–94), Oliver Stang (1995–97), Jens Herbsthoff (1998–99), Thorsten Horn (2000–04), Klaus Liermann (2005–06), Stefan Vahldieck (2007–08), Jean-Pascal Lohof (2009–11), Thorsten Horn (2012), Dominik Braun (2013–17), Stephan Klünder (2018–19), Meiko Krämer (2020).

Others

  • In the Bochum city area there are not only the statue of Count Engelbert but also some references to the city festival: For the 600th anniversary of the May Evening Festival in 1988, part of Diekampstraße in Bochum city center was renamed Junggesellenstraße.
  • In Harpen (Bochum) there is a primary school called Maischützenschule.
  • Hiltroper Strasse was renamed Maischützenstrasse in 1929 as the Maischützenstrasse route to Bockholt. In the Bockholt itself, a small memorial commemorates the tradition of the festival.
  • The Cochem vigilante group and the May Evening Society in Bochum have been on friendly terms since the mid-1950s .
  • The Bochum May Evening Festival had to be canceled due to the corona virus in 2020. So this was the first failure of the festival after World War II.
  • The statue of Count Engelbert was inaugurated on July 4, 2020 at its new location (the lower square of the Propsteikirche next to the Beckporte) by the Lord Mayor Thomas Eiskirch, the bachelor captain Meiko Krämer and the 1st chairman Stefan Vahldieck.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ http://www.bochumer-maiabendgesellschaft.de/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=80&Itemid=134
  2. ↑ http://www.bochum.de/cms/bochumbase.nsf/vwContentByKey/W277NBDB134BOLDDE
  3. ↑ 'Text on the homepage of the May Evening Society'
  4. ↑ Bochum annual show table of contents
  5. ↑ Explanation board on the street name sign
  6. ^ School website
  7. ^ City of Bochum: Bochum street names - origin and interpretation , Bochum 1992, ISBN 3-80930176-0 .
  8. ↑ Cochem and Bochum: The vigilante groups make friendships between cities

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