When both my girls were doing town cheer-leading for Pop Warner football, own town team was the Blue Devils.  Me and a couple of dads would do back and forth cheers like: “Hey Cheerleaders” from the crowd with the girls during lulls in the football action or spaces in between their routines. It caught on and became a regular thing. One day we got there and there were “Cheer Dad” T-shirts there waiting for us.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We used to do small local competitions at local high schools and one larger one at the Reggie Lewis Center in Boston. For that I thought we needed to go bigger. So about 4 hours prior to the Comp, I hit Michaels and got working, making a custom T-shirt and face paint and devil horns.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

After that my youngest daughter wanted to do competitive cheer, so we joined our current gym.The photo of me at the Reggie Lewis comp somehow made it to the owner of the gym through Facebook while we were at a comp in Providence, RI in January 2016, and she approached my wife and said, how come he doesn’t do that for our girls? It got back to me, and I honestly didn’t think that kind of thing was encouraged. I asked if it was alright to use the team image on a flag which I had made in China, it arrived and was revealed at the Athletic Championships at Boston University in Feb of 2016.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The face paint and headdress were revealed at the Spirit Festival in Hartford CT about a month later. Everyone called me Big Chief. So it was from there that the name Big Chief Wannamak’emcheer was born!!

​

​

​

​

 

 

 

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

Every competition since I have tried to make at least 1 addition to the costume to keep it from getting stale. In Columbus, Ohio  last year, my then 9 yr old son, joined in and started with having his painted and wearing one of my furry boot covers as a wig. And Flash was created! We have since added a lot to his costume.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

​

​

​

​

​

​

In January of 2017, at a comp in Worcester, MA we saw someone with a sign that had blue led lights on it that really looked awesome in the dark, so the search started for something that would make a huge impact on the look. I found the LED wings on-line and they were revealed in Lowell, MA in February 2017.

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

​

 

I have recently incorporated music in to the the experience. If anyone has some ideas for theme music, please submit them.

​

In March of 2017, I was asked to be a part of the CheerMAD parents panel, which I glad fully accepted.

​

Incidentally on my Facebook page, there is a comment on one of my photos from one of my daughter’s original town coaches, saying “You were our cheer dad first!”    I LOVE THAT!!!

 

If you have any questions please email them to me directly at: bigchiefwannamakemcheer@gmail.com