"topping out" traditions of the high-steel ironworkers, The

Western Folklore, Fall 2001 by Robinson, John V

When the phrase "topping out" supplanted the earlier names for the custom may never be known. Part of the reason for the change in terminology might be the specificity of terms like "bushing" and "Wetting the bush." These terms apply only to the tree ceremony and the libation that accompanies it. Topping out applies to the totality of the event-whatever it might entail. The second edition of the Oxford English Dictionary traces topping out back to 1961 and has a 1962 reference to a green bough being nailed to the roof to protect future inhabitants. I recently queried Joan Hall, the editor of the Dictionary of American Regional English, as to her finding in the matter. DARE was unable to trace the term back beyond the citations in the OED. I have traced the word in print back to 1931 and passed my references along to DARE.

The earliest article I have found documenting the custom in America is William Collins' 1931 Pencil Points offering "Our Queerest Building Custom." In this article Collins offers several examples of the custom from Europe and America and argues the custom is the modern extension of ancient tree worship. The real importance of Collins' article is that it shows most of the elements of the modern topping out (i.e., the tree, the flag, the party, and the term "topping-out") were already in place among ironworkers in America as early as 1930. In his essay Collins asserts that the flag is often used as a substitute for the tree and he further speculates (wrongly) that the tree ceremony will die out completely. Collins' writes, "the tendency towards the use of the flag instead of a tree suggests that it will not be many years before the roof-tree custom will have disappeared" Collins 1931: 182). The 1931 use of topped out by Collins provides us with a useful terminus ante quem. The term topped out was no doubt in use for some time before Collins reported it in print. An earlier printed reference may yet come to light.

It was another 20 years before the subject was addressed in an academic journal again. In the Autumn of 1950 New York Folklore Quarterly printed Ellen S. Lawrence's essay "The Lore of the Building Trades." Lawrence tells us that her article is "the product of many jobs" that she has conflated with information she gleaned from her own family (145). Written in the manner of a diary we find this entry for Saturday June 25:

During the month since my last entry, a network of steel and brick and concrete has become a building. Thursday was the greatest day of the job. At about two o'clock, the masonry foreman climbed to the highest point on the building and there placed a tree sprig, an announcement to all that we had "topped out." Amidst such shouting and rejoicing, a great many barrels of beer were rolled out of the main shanty for all. There was food as well as drink and no one worked; as far as the masons and the [steel] erectors were concerned, the job was finished ... This was a "raising" celebration, modern style! (152).

It's interesting to note in this passage that it is the masonry foreman who places the tree atop the structure. Unfortunately, Lawrence's writing style of conflating anecdotes into a first-person journal narrative makes it well nigh impossible to accurately date her acquisition of the term topping out. We cannot even be sure where, when, or if, any of these events actually happened.