George Major, known as the Pearly King of Peckham, wears his blinged-out suit in 2024. He died in August at age 88.
Tony Kershaw/Getty Images
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Tony Kershaw/Getty Images
LONDON — It was one of my most memorable interviews. Even though we both spoke English, I could barely understand a word he said.
“Seafood sellers used to throw whistles at that frog and that toad,” he said – at least I think after listening to my tape a few times, no one is any the wiser.
Our interview dates back to 2016, during one of my first NPR reporting trips to London. George Major, then aged 78, was a local celebrity. We walked together through the East End, where the factories and docks around which Major grew up during World War II have given way to glass skyscrapers. A vendor ran out into the street to give him a high-five. Tourists took photos.
Major had arrived in a blingy outfit: a black suit and a flat cap, both adorned with sequins, sequins and mother-of-pearl buttons. His title – Pearly King of Peckham – was emblazoned on glittering buttons on the back of his jacket.
He was a charming wheeler dealer. But his language – a mixture of what he called “backspeak” and Cockney rhyming slang – was impossible for this unfortunate American visitor to understand.
At one point during our video interview, I glanced at the camera and exclaimed, “We could use a translator here!”
Ten years later, I laugh every time I land at Heathrow Airport, where a portrait of Major covers an entire wall. But this summer, a former colleague alerted me to an article in the local press that hit me harder than I expected: the pearly king of Peckham died on August 1, at the age of 88.
He was buried on September 14 in a cemetery not far from Cockney Museum he founded. A horse-drawn cart carried his coffin to a small chapel whose walls shook with mourners singing raucous pub songs. One of the gardeners outside looked baffled.
At the graveside, I approached the Major family, offered my condolences, and hesitantly shared the story of my brief and confusing 2016 encounter with their loved one.
A horde of pearly kings, queens, princes and princesses – four generations of the Major family, all dressed in matching pearly costumes – turned and looked at me, some in tears, then threw back their heads and laughed.
“A real cheeky and happy Cockney!” » said her daughter Janet Major, hugging me.
Who are the members of the pearly royal family?
The pearly kings and queens, dressed in clothes adorned with mother-of-pearl buttons, pledge to raise funds for charity.
Laura Chiesa/LightRocket to know Getty Images
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Laura Chiesa/LightRocket to know Getty Images
In the 1870s, an orphaned street sweeper named Henry Croft began decorating his suit with mother-of-pearl buttons scavenged from the streets outside the textile mills that once dotted London’s East End.
His pearly suit infused menial labor with dignity – a regal air, even – and launched what would become a working-class institution in East London: the pearly kings and queens.
“These pearly suits are now cultural artifacts with fantastic designs, telling a deep story about London and the Cockneys, what we call unposh Londoners,” says Andy Green, co-founder of the Modern Cockney Festival, an annual celebration of London’s diverse working-class communities.
Some of the so-called pearls were street vendors, market vendors or fly casters – traders without licenses. Others canvassed for charitable purposes. Many were immigrants, their slang peppered with Yiddish or Bengali words. They have become a neighborhood staple, adorned with mother-of-pearl.
“There were what we call costermongers, which is a fancy word for street vendors,” Green says. “Imagine that you are an immigrant newly arrived in the country. One of the first jobs you might have might be hustling and selling goods on the street.”
That’s what George Major did. Born in 1938 in a military barracks in Peckham, southeast London, he was abandoned as a child, grew up in a workshop and found odd jobs in the local market as a teenager, says his daughter Janet.
“Dad eventually became one of the kings of traders who ran market stalls,” she says. “It wasn’t an easy childhood, but he followed the ideals of Henry Croft. It was before the welfare state, when you had to help your friends, your neighbors, your community.”
Janet Major describes the weekends of her childhood, with her father leading his seven children, going door to door in matching pearl suits, asking for money for charity.
Today, an ever-decreasing number of pearls canvassing for charity such as children’s hospitals, women’s shelters and veterans groups. They participate in street festivals in the summer and participate in parades.
George Major later trained as a plumber and ran a plumbing supply store, she said.
Pop culture gems
On screen, the pearly kings inspired the chimney sweep character with a heart of gold Bert in the Walt Disney film. Mary Poppins film – played by Dick Van Dyke, an American who later confessed what he called “the most atrocious cockney accent in the history of cinema.”
The Major family and others believe that George Major himself inspired another fictional character: DelBoythe happy-go-lucky East London barker in the long-running British sitcom Only fools and horses. He’s a brazen salesman, always looking to get rich quick, with the slogan: “By this time next year, we’ll be millionaires!”
At his funeral, Major’s eulogy was peppered with quotes from Del Boy.
But like the TV protagonist, Major also broke the law. In 2012, he was sentenced to six months in prison, after plead guilty to welfare fraud. He was released early.
“If he could escape the taxman, he would!” her daughter laughs. “He used to say, ‘Discount for cash!’ He would love a good deal.
His fame has overshadowed his legal troubles. Major was one of dozens of pearly royals who marched at the opening ceremony of the 2012 London Olympics.
What is Cockney rhyming slang?
George Major, seen here in 1975, was born in 1938 in a military barracks in Peckham, south-east London, and grew up in a workhouse before becoming the best-known pearl king of his generation.
Archives Chris Moorhouss/Hulton via Getty Images
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Archives Chris Moorhouss/Hulton via Getty Images
Years later, I finally understood what Major meant in 2016 when he told me he was a “costermonger” (traveling peddler) who used to “fly-pitch” (sell stuff without a license) on the “frog and toad” where we did our interview.
In Cockney rhyming slang, “frog and toad” means road. “Porky pies” means lies. “Apples and pears” means stairs. “Whistle and flute” means costume. “Ruby Murray” means curry. The vocabulary is vast and confusing to outsiders – and that is precisely the point. Green, the Cockney expert, says this type of slang probably originated as code to confuse police or secretly rig prices among street vendors.
To complicate matters, Major also spoke in what he calls “backspeak”, sometimes also called backslang, which is even more confusing. One example that has crept into traditional British slang is the word “yob” for boy. Take any word and simply spell it backwards.
Bid “lleweraf” to a pearly legend
One of the only parts of that 2016 interview that I could understand at the time was when Major waxed poetic about the unique pattern of his family’s pearly costume. He showed off a row of buttons on his sleeve, calling them “the lifeline.”
Ten years later, at her funeral, I found myself examining the same pattern on a pearly outfit worn by her great-granddaughter.
“There’s a straight line, which is your life line,” said Aleisha Gordon, 19, pointing to a row of sparkling buttons. “Triangles represent the ups and downs of life, and flowers are the friends and family who help you along the way.”
After the funeral, children threw handfuls of earth as George Major’s coffin was lowered into the ground. The undertaker released four caged doves for Major’s descendants to release into the sky. The birds circled twice above us, then disappeared.
People shared anecdotes about a “real naughty guy” and “the most hilarious person” who was nonetheless “very picky” about who made his tea. Someone turned on a boombox and mourners began kicking like a cancan while singing songs from the 1950s.
They paraded out of the cemetery towards a nearby nuclear submarine – what Cockneys call the pub – for a cold pint of Pig’s Ear, or King Lear.
At least that’s what the pearly king of Peckham would have called it. Now I finally understand.
Gn world
