Title: Battery Change (Hanover FD)
General Information:
- Place of collection: Hanover Fire Department – Hanover, NH
- Date of Collection: November 6, 2019
- Informant: Joe Amato
- Genre: Customary Folklore – Superstition
Informant Information:
Joe Amato is a firefighter for the Hanover, New Hampshire fire department. He is currently 27 years old and lives in Hanover. However, Joe was born and raised in Amherst, Massachusetts. He currently holds the title of firefighter at the Hanover Fire Department. Also, at age 27, Joe is the youngest firefighter currently a part of the Hanover Fire Department.
Context:
Every morning right as their shift is starting, the firefighters come in, look at the log of recent calls, and change their batteries in their radios. They change the batteries whether or not they are dead or are fully charged. According to them, changing the batteries each day brings them good luck and decreases the likelihood of them receiving a lot of calls that day. They learned this superstition from some of the older firefighters in the Hanover FD when they were first beginning.
Item:
Every day at 7:00am, the firefighters come in and change all of the radio batteries (regardless of whether or not the batteries are low) for good luck during their shift.
Associated Image:
Meaning and Interpretation:
This action provides the firefighters with a sense of assurance that everything will go as planned that day and that nothing terrible is going to happen during their shift. In a profession as unpredictable as firefighting, it is important to control everything that you can – even if it is simply changing the batteries in a radio. This is an example of a magic superstition because there is cause and effect – changing the batteries brings them good luck and a lower likelihood of having a bad day. Also, it appears that there may be some semblance of the law of similarity at play. Through the process of preparing their radios for the day, they are preparing themselves (mentally and with equipment) for the day.