Alex Helm

Helm was born in Burnley, Lancashire, in 1920, becoming interested in folk dancing whilst attending Burnley Grammar School. After finishing teacher training, Helm joined the army, where during the Second World War he served in the Indian Army Ordnance Corps, reaching the rank of Major. While posted in India, Helm met his future wife, Mehr Suntook ("Sunny"). He served in India until it became independent in 1947, whereupon he returned to England. == Career ==

After the war, Helm taught at Northumberland Heath Secondary School, Erith. While in Erith, Helm married, and his first child was born. His second child was born in 1953. In 1968 he was made deputy headmaster at Danesford. He was also part of a Home Office committee on approved schools. == Folklore research ==

Helm began to take an interest in the history of dances and dramatic traditions of Lancashire and Cheshire, in part influenced by Margaret Dean-Smith, Librarian of the English Folk Dance and Song Society (EFDSS), with whom Helm had helped to sort and index the Society's papers. Within a year of his move to Cheshire he had published research on ‘The Cheshire Soul-caking Play’, a type of folk play that had been little studied. During this period Helm, now a member of the Manchester Morris Men troupe, also began to research Lancastrian Morris traditions. Helm joined the Folklore Society in 1954, and from 1958 was on the society's council. Ordish, a 19th-century folklorist who specialised on mummers' plays, had planned – but never completed – a monograph on British folk drama. Norman Peacock and Roger Marriott. The group co-authored 'A Geographical Index of the Ceremonial Dance in Great Britain', which was published as two journal articles in 1960 and 1961 and English Ritual Drama: A Geographical Index in 1967. English Ritual Drama is now seen as a seminal work, being the "first systematic attempt to list every known occurrence of the folk play in Britain and to provide a source for each location". == Recognition and influence ==

In 1968 Helm was awarded the Coote Lake Medal of the Folklore Society, for "outstanding research and scholarship" in the field of Folklore Studies. Whilst never a field collector, he was hailed for his "great ability to interest and stimulate others, and to guide them with his deep and growing knowledge". Helm died in 1970: his life and work being "cut short as he reached his peak". His collaborator E. C. Cawte dedicated his 1978 monograph Ritual Animal Disguise to Helm. Helm had a considerable influence on later customs researchers in England, particularly through the geographic approach he advocated. His argument that folk dance and folk play should be studied as rituals or customs - as opposed to the literary approach adopted by earlier scholars like E. K. Chambers - became the adopted model (although one criticised by later researchers). == C0llections ==

Helm's research papers - including correspondence, manuscript notebooks and working papers for his research on seasonal customs - are held at University College London. == Selected publications ==

• Helm, Alex (1950). "The Cheshire Soul-Caking Play". Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. 6 (2): 45–50. • Helm, Alex (1954). "The Rushcart and the North-Western Morris". Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. 7 (3): 172–179. • Helm, Alex (1955-09-01). "Report on the Ordish Papers". Folklore. 66 (3): 360–362. • Cawte, E. C.; Helm, Alex; Marriott, R. J.; Peacock, N. (1960). "A Geographical Index of the Ceremonial Dance in Great Britain: Part One". Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. 9 (1): ii–41. • Cawte, E. C.; Helm, Alex; Peacock, N. (1961). "A Geographical Index of the Ceremonial Dance in Great Britain: Addenda and Corrigenda". Journal of the English Folk Dance and Song Society. 9 (2): 93–95. • Helm, Alex (1965-06-01). "In Comes I, St George". Folklore. 76 (2): 118–136. • Cawte, E. C; Helm, Alex; Peacock, N (1967). English ritual drama: a geographical index,. London: Folk-lore Society. • Helm, Alex (1981). ''The English mummers' play: With a foreword by N. Peacock and E.C. Cawte''. Woodbridge, Suffolk: Brewer. == References ==