First Women in Uptown

First women join Uptown String Band

By BARBARA J. ISENBERG
Bucks County Courier Times
Part of an occasional series.

Growing up, Amanda Ettinger had a rather unconventional answer to the question, "What do you want to be when you grow up?"

"I always answered, 'I want to be a Mummer,'" said Ettinger, who is from a family full of Mummers. "And unfortunately at the time, that wasn't a possibility, but I figured if I hung in there someday, someday [I could be a Mummer, too]."

The Uptown String Band in Hulmeville made that someday for Ettinger and three other women in late September when the band voted to accept women for the first time. Ettinger came from the Durning String Band in New Jersey. Kim Miller, Diana Miller and Laura Hopkins all transferred to Uptown from the Irish-American String Band.

Traditionally an all-male performance art, Mummery has been a Philadelphia tradition since Jan. 1, 1901, according to www.mummers.com. Even before the American Revolution, there were reports of "rowdy groups 'parading' on New Year's Day," the Web site says.

But those groups didn't include women until the late 1980s, when the first bands began opening their doors to both sexes. "At the turn of the century, I don't think anyone entertained the notion of allowing a woman to walk that far [up Broad Street for the New Year's Day Parade]," Ettinger, a dancer in the band, surmised. "I don't think they thought we had the fortitude."

On Saturday, women played instruments or danced in roughly half of the 16 string bands at the Philadelphia String Band Association's Show of Shows in Atlantic City. The top three bands in the New Year's Parade - Fralinger, Quaker City and Ferko - are still all-male. As they donned feathers, sequins and instruments to strut their stuff at Boardwalk Hall, Uptown members talked about the transition in the band over the past few months.

"The first time we had the girls on the bus it was like, 'Well, we all have to watch what we say'," Jim Gutekunst of Villanova said with a laugh. "That first trip was apprehensive, but it was fine after that. They just had to accept us."


The band's first vote in May on whether to accept women was voted down by one vote.
"Despite the fact that the band was literally split earlier in the year on whether they wanted women in the band, you would be hard pressed to find the 18 that voted against it," Ettinger said Saturday.

"The guys who voted against it in May, they're fine with it now," Gutekunst agreed. "Most of their objections were that they joined because it was all male and they just didn't want it to change." Declining membership in the band was the reason for the consideration, said band President Vince Sannelli.

"It got to the point where we were losing Mummers," Sannelli said. "We felt it was time to open the doors to everybody." Kim Miller, who is not related to Diana Miller, had waited for those doors to open. "I kept asking all year, 'When are you voting, when are you voting?'" she said. "I had helped them out a few times last year and really wanted to join as a playing member."

When that chance finally came, it was smooth sailing for the men to get acclimated to performing with women, band members said. "It was no big deal," Steve Schrader of Bensalem said. "It was easy to do." Mark Gallagher of Falls agreed. "It really hasn't made much of a difference," he said. "The more people here, the better."

Diana Miller, who plays the baritone saxophone, said for the women the transition has been easy, but maybe less so for the men. "The guys, I think, are really still getting used to it," she said. "But they've accepted us as one of the guys, which is what you gotta do in the Mummer world."