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Paddy Murphy is a fictional character in North American folklore known primarily for receiving eccentric funeral rites. Originating in the nineteenth century, Murphy’s fame has grown for being both the subject of a popular and oft-reproduced folk song and the namesake of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon (SAE) fraternity’s various Paddy Murphy traditions. The common theme in all versions of the story and its associated customs is celebrating the life of the deceased Murphy through the consumption of large quantities of alcohol.
The name Paddy is a nickname for Patrick, a common Irish name, but it has also been used as a derogatory label for Irish people, especially males. The label was especially common in the nineteenth century when it regularly appeared in discussions of Irish immigrants to the Americas. In this context, the name Paddy Murphy could easily be used to describe a sort of Irish everyman, lending support to the idea that Murphy was a stereotype rather than an actual person.
Early versions of the Paddy Murphy tale followed a typical pattern within late nineteenth-century tales of Irish Americans, focusing on “incredible blunders followed up by antic responses” (Williams 1996, 156). Although the exact origins are uncertain, a tale involving a group of Irish men drinking to excess in memory of a deceased friend and forgetting the dead body at a pub on the way to the cemetery can be dated back at least as far as 1887. It is this version that was adopted in the folk song “The Night Paddy Murphy Died,” which embraces the comical nature of the story in the style of an Irish drinking song, suggesting that some Irish Americans were often at least partially complicit in propagating their own stereotypes. Although the song is often attributed to Johnny Burke (1851–1930), a songwriter from Newfoundland, the song’s origins are unknown. It is possible that it was an anonymous song of late nineteenth-century origin, since the original tale seems to date back to that point.
Paddy Murphy began his ascendance to SAE fame in the 1940s, when various chapters of the fraternity began holding yearly Paddy Murphy events. Early celebrations largely promoted alcohol consumption and partying. However, later the fraternity would blend themes of Irish folklore and fraternity values with quasi-historical narratives of the Prohibition era in America. Within this context, Murphy is usually described as one of Al Capone’s most successful rumrunners, although he is sometimes portrayed as Capone’s competition. This Murphy was a larger-than-life gangster, who was great in a fight, weaned on hard liquor as an infant, spent many days each week in confession, and had numerous romantic entanglements. As such, Murphy’s greatest threat was Murphy himself, or someone of equally legendary proportions.
One of the earliest variants of the tradition had Murphy die of illness each year on the way to visit local branches of the fraternity, which then created the opportunity for an alcohol-fueled wake. At Iowa State University, the Paddy Murphy Party involved a story of an alumnus whose dying wish was to be buried in the fraternity’s front lawn. Other universities also embraced the idea of Murphy as a returning alumnus, posting notices that an alumnus was returning, but then got sick and died.
When the Prohibition gangster versions of Murphy started appearing near the end of the twentieth century, accounts of his demise varied among local SAE legends, with the most common being that he was shot and killed by Eliot Ness, which became especially common after the 1987 movie The Untouchables featured Kevin Costner in the role of Ness as he took the fight to Capone. Other versions had him being shot either by Capone himself or by someone named McSorely, either for stealing rum or for refusing to kill a police officer who was an SAE brother. Regardless of who killed him, Murphy would reveal himself, either by a handshake or a lapel pin depending on the variant, to be an alumnus of SAE and would receive an honorary funeral, usually from his killer, who is generally branded as an SAE alumnus.
The result is that many local SAE branches continue to this day to carry out diverse funeral rites in honor of Murphy on a yearly or at least regular basis, involving copious amounts of alcohol, drawing connections back to the earlier Murphy tales. Although the morbidly humorous method of celebration and the opportunity to drink alcohol in excess are major elements in the various versions of this tradition, it is also clearly a morality play reenacted on various campuses that demonstrates the essential virtues of the fraternity to its members and prospective members.
Neil Terrence George
See also Academe, Legends of; Death Coach; Urban Legends/Urban Belief Tales
Further Reading
Bronner, Simon J. 2012. Campus Traditions: Folklore from the Old-Time College to the Modern Mega-University. Jackson: University Press of Mississippi.
Dezell, Maureen. 2002. Irish America: Coming into Clover. New York: Anchor Books.
Stivers, Richard A. 1976. A Hair of the Dog: Irish Drinking and American Stereotype. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press.
Williams, William H. A. 1996. ’Twas Only an Irishman’s Dream: The Image of Ireland and the Irish in American Popular Song Lyrics, 1800–1920. Urbana: University of Illinois Press.