New York school bans 'Jingle Bells' due to its ‘questionable past’
An elementary school in New York is banning the popular holiday classic "Jingle Bells" due to a discovery that the song was possibly first sung in a minstrel show with performers wearing blackface.
Council Rock Primary School in Brighton decided to exclude the festive song due to the possible blackface connection, the Rochester Beacon reports.
The school reached the decision using research from 2017 by Boston University professor Kyna Hamill, who discovered that the song's first public performance may have been in a minstrel show involving blackface performers 150 years ago. Some members of the community have expressed that removing the song goes too far.
"You hear 'Jingle Bells,' and it's just the spirit of Christmas time," says Mary Santiago from Rochester. "Christmas without 'Jingle Bells' isn't Christmas. I feel it's ridiculous." Others feel that the school's actions were appropriate.