I’m a proud Philadelphian and lifelong fan of the Philadelphia Mummers. I became a fan of the Philadelphia Mummers on New Years Day 1985 watching the parade with my mom, who was a big mummers fan. In the following years, I would record the Mummers Parade on VHS and rent the tape to some of the local string bands after the parade. As a kid, I took accordion lessons with the hopes of joining a string band but stopped taking lessons after my mother became ill and passed away when I was 10 years old.
As I grew older and went to college for Multimedia and Instructional Technology, I wanted to find a way I could use my talents as an Educational Technology expert to promote the Philadelphia Mummers tradition to a wider audience. I started Mr. Mummer as a project where I could anonymously refine my technical and writing skills. In 2012, Mr. Mummer started as a Twitter feed and became so popular that I expanded to Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram. My brother convinced me to start the Mr. Mummer blog in 2014 and I have been managing the blog and all social media accounts since then. I strive to share Mummers news, events, audio, video, and photos. Also, I post the latest information about the upcoming Philadelphia Mummers Parade.
The Mr. Mummer blog gets visited over 200,000 times per year, generates over half a million page views, and is visited by thousands of people around the world on New Year’s Day. Mr. Mummer has been featured in the Philadelphia Inquirer and is often cited by major media outlets like Newsweek and Philly.com. I do not get paid or seek any money from my work on Mr. Mummer. I do it as a hobby because I truly enjoy helping the Mummers get exposure to a worldwide audience and I love helping people learn about the Philadelphia Mummers tradition.