Holiday Folklore: Black Friday

Once upon a time there was an evil Shopping Witch.  This evil witch laid a curse on the Beautiful Princess, Incredible Deal.  Princess Incredible Deal would only awaken once a year, on the Friday after Thanksgiving.  Every year on this fateful day score of shoppers flock to stores to get a glimpse of Princess Incredible Deal’s singular Beauty.  But the evil Troll Crowd threatens…

Okay, there is no real “Holiday Folklore” for Black Friday.  But the name makes this day sound as if it should have such a wonderful tale behind it. 

♦  The Reason it is called Black Friday

The reason the Friday after thanksgiving got the name was because it is the biggest single shopping day of the year.  Besides the bargains –Princess Incredible Deal- there is a definite dark side.  There are crowds, traffic, theft and personal injury far greater than normal for most days of the year.  This is the “black” in Black Friday.  If it were all good it would be called Door-buster Friday, since “door-buster” is the industry term for the incredible bargains.

♦  Genesis of the name “Black Friday”

The first known usage of the term “Black Friday” was from Philadelphia.  It was used in a paper by Bonnie Taylor-Blake of the American Dialect Society.  Mrs. Taylor-Blake was discussing how the term had begun to be used to describe the day by Philadelphia Policemen.

“JANUARY 1966 - “Black Friday” is the name which the Philadelphia Police Department has given to the Friday following Thanksgiving Day. It is not a term of endearment to them. “Black Friday” officially opens the Christmas shopping season in center city and it usually brings massive traffic jams and over-crowded sidewalks as the downtown stores are mobbed from opening to closing.”

In an article in 1975, the New York Times picked up on the older term and used it in their article. 

“Philadelphia police and bus drivers call it “Black Friday” - that day each year between Thanksgiving Day and the Army–Navy Game. It is the busiest shopping and traffic day of the year in the Bicentennial City as the Christmas list is checked off and the Eastern college football season nears conclusion.”

In the years following the New York Times piece, the term slowly spread around the East Coast slowly growing in usage.  I distinctly remember hearing the term used sometime when I was in High School in the late 1980’s.

By 2000 the term had come into full fruition of usage becoming a national phrase for the day after Thanksgiving.  With stores catching on to the sales opportunity, more amazing deals, and stunning crowds have begun to arrive.  Making the deals brighter but the Friday ever Blacker.  Black Friday is here and here to stay.