Happy Wayzgoose

August 24^th  is the traditional holiday for  printers, editors, reporters, engravers and others working at a newspaper or printing company.

The Wayzgoose printers holiday was August 24

The centuries-old holiday has largely been forgotten in the late 20^th century, but it was still very much alive a generation or two ago among printing unions in the UK.

The holiday has its origins in the feast day for St. Bartholomew, the patron saint of scribes and, later, of printers and writers.

The odd name for the holiday, Wayzgoose, refers to the centerpiece of this holiday meal: a goose that had been fattened on stubble (or wayz) from a harvested field of grain.

According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the Wayzgoose was

An entertainment given by a master-printer to his workmen ‘about Bartholomew-tide’ (24 August), marking the beginning of the season of working by candle-light. In later use, an annual festivity held in summer by the employees of a printing establishment, consisting of a dinner and (usually) an excursion into the country.

The celebration would be held at the master printer’s home, or in later centuries, as part of an excursion into the country.

The Wayzgoose was often the occasion for the introduction of new apprentices, the promotion of older apprentices to journeymen, and speeches about the virtues of the profession.

A speech by the company’s owner or master printer might include a reminder   that printers had much in common with the monks who once laboriously copied books by hand.

He (or sometimes she) might tell them that the printing company was still called a chapel, the foreman was still called the sextant, and the apprentices were still called printers devils.  The owner might also say that people in the publishing industries were bound together like pages in a book, in a brotherhood of printing, with the duty to promote both faith and reason.

The speech might be concluded with a toast “to the music of the press,” which would set off a loud thumping, rumbling and hammering of mugs on tables, in a kind of inebriated mock imitation of the daily sounds of the printing shop.

It would be followed by dancing and music and great quantities of ale and whiskey.

The Wayzgoose is worth remembering because, until recently, printing involved a strong living culture at the heart of European and American society. It’s possible to get an impression of  this by reading the description of the Wayzgoose (also called Way-goose) in Joseph Moxon’s printing manual of 1683:

Way-gooses are always kept about Bartholomew-tide… The Master Printer … makes [the workers] a good Feast, and not only entertains them at his own House, but besides, gives them Money to spend at the Ale-house or Tavern at Night; And to this Feast, they invite the Correcter, Founder, Smith, Joyner and Inck-maker… And till the Master Printer have given this Way-goose, the Journey-men do not use to Work by Candle Light.

REFERENCES

Moxon, Joseph.  Mechanick Exercises: Or, the Doctrine of Handy Works Applied to the Art of Printing, London, 2^nd edition, 1683. See Ancient Customs of the Chapel p. 361 (GB pdf p. 198).

The Wayzgoose – Part of a history project of Scottish printing, these pages show a photo of men on a holiday excursion in the mid-20th century.

Definition of Wayzgoose at World Wide Words

Today, Yale University and Seattle’s School of Visual Concepts still celebrate the craft printing tradition with a Wayzgoose.

The Oxford English Dictionary also contains these references to the Wayzgoose:

1731    N. Bailey Universal Etymol. Eng. Dict. (ed. 5) ,   Wayz, a Bundle of Straw. Wayz~goose, a Stubble-Goose, an Entertainment given to Journey~men at the beginning of Winter.

1833    Temperley Songs of the Press 23 (note) ,   Way Goose.— The derivation of this term is not generally known. It is from the old English word wayz, stubble. A wayz Goose was the head dish at the annual feast of the forefathers of our fraternity. ‘Wayz Goose, a stubble Goose, an entertainment given to journeymen at the beginning of Winter.’—Bailey.]

1875    J. Southward Dict. Typogr. 137   The wayzgoose generally consists of a trip into the country, open air amusements, a good dinner, and speeches and toasts afterwards.

1895    Surrey Mirror 23 Aug. 2/7   The members of the typographical staffs of the Surrey Advertiser (Guildford) and the Surrey Mirror (Redhill) had their wayzgoose on Saturday last, when they journeyed to Brighton.

1880    F. T. Buckland Notes & Jottings (1882) 39   London printers generally have a ‘wayzgoose’ dinner in the autumn.

1897    F. T. Bullen Cruise ‘Cachalot’ 372   Carriages were chartered, an enormous quantity of eatables and drinkables provided, and away we went, a regular wayzgoose or bean~feast party.