Striker's Independent Society
The Strikers Independent Society (S. I. S.) is a mystic society founded in 1843 in Mobile, Alabama (during Mobile's first American period) and participated in Carnival during New Year's Eve and New Year's Day celebrations. It is the oldest remaining mystic society in America but no longer hosts an annual parade. History. The "Strikers Independent Society" was formed initially by young men in Mobile who had been refused membership to the older Cowbellion de Rakin Society (which had been formed in year 1830 by "more sedate and astute men of the city"). In  the beginning, it was designated as a bachelor-only society, and if a member married, then they were out of the society. The Strikers, like the Cowbellions, paraded only on New Year's Eve and held their ball on New Year's Day. In 1852, they became the first mystic society to hold a ball at the Battle House Hotel. By 1881, the Strikers Independent Society had discontinued their annual street parades, but continued to hold a grand ball on New Year's Eve, though in 1884, they paraded once more. In 1902, their theme was "Colonial Mobile" celebrating the  bicentennial of Mobile's founding (1702). Members wore costumes representing the French, British, Spanish, and American periods of Mobile's history. Offshoots in New Orleans. Just as New Orleans became the capital of French Louisiana ("Louisianne") about twenty years (1723) after Mobile (1702), the mystic societies of New Orleans were created by Mobile society members about 20 years after the original Mobile societies had been founded: The other mystic societies had a reciprocal effect in Mobile from New Orleans, when they paraded in 1865 while Mobile parades had been discontinued due to the Civil War, for they inspired Joe Cain  to return to Mobile, in the midst of the Union Army occupation, and revive the Mardi Gras celebration in Mobile, where it had started back in 1703.