Bud Billiken Club - Origins

Origins

Many believe that the billiken (a smiling, rotund elf-like creature popular in the early 1900s) came to be the mascot for the Bud Billiken Club when Abbott spotted a jolly deity on the door of a Chinese restaurant, and upon learning that it represented the protector of children decided to use it as the Club’s mascot. However, in 1923 an eleven-year-old boy named Willard Motley submitted a drawing to the Defender of a pudgy and cheerful boy, which Abbott subsequently named the "new Billikin." The name "Bud Billiken" is a pseudonym that Abbott selected for the organization, using his own nickname "Bud"; the word "Billiken" was believed to be in reference to a character in Chinese mythology who was the protector of children. Though the billiken was actually created by an American woman in 1908, the figure still represented the guardian angel and patron of children and Abbott placed Motley’s drawing on the paper’s children’s page, the Defender Junior. Known as “the first Billiken,” Motley continued to pen drawings for the Defender Junior for the next seven years.

The “Rules of the Bud Billiken Club” guided youth to take pride in their race and to strive towards middle class respectability. It was also meant as a way to give underprivileged children a creative outlet and a chance to shine in the limelight. Over the years Bud Billiken became the mascot not only for the children’s page, but for the whole newspaper. Abbott organized dozens of Bud Billiken Clubs nationwide for children who pledged to read the Defender.