Fly, Eagles Fly: How two Mummers gave Philadelphia an anthem

The Pirates of the Caribbean boat plunged down a hill, transporting the passengers at Walt Disney World to the days of thieves and outlaws on the open sea.

It was a familiar trip a few years ago for Bobby Mansure, who worked at the amusement park for a bit after graduating from Temple in 1989. But when the water splashed this time, Mansure felt like he was in South Philadelphia instead of the West Indies.

“We hit that little drop, and the two boats in front of us just started singing the fight song,” Mansure said.

Mansure helped coin that fight song — “Fly, Eagles Fly” — in the 1990s after reworking a song the Eagles introduced in the 1950s when they played at Connie Mack Stadium. The song was first played in the parking lots before being brought into Veterans Stadium, where it took off in the early 2000s just as the Birds started to win again. It’s now an essential piece of the team as fans sing along after every touchdown at Lincoln Financial Field.

The fight song has grown to represent much more than just TDs or even football. The 33-second ditty — simple enough that a toddler can learn the words — became an anthem for Philadelphians. It’s something to belt in Disney World to let the pirates know that Philadelphians are here.

“It’s almost like a dog peeing,” Mansure said. “You’re establishing your territory.”

Mansure met Brian Saunders in the early 1990s while playing casinos and other gigs around town. They both grew up as Mummers — Mansure marched with South Philadelphia while Saunders played for Palmyra — and thought the Eagles could use a string band. The Phillies had one on Sundays. So they asked the Birds if they wanted to do the same.

“We were shocked that they called back,” Saunders said. “We were just at the right place at the right time.”

The Eagles hired them in 1996 to play music in the parking lots as the three-piece band — Saunders played the tenor saxophone, Mansure played the lead saxophone, and Anthony “Skull” DiMeo played the banjo — bounced from tailgate to tailgate. They wore Ricky Watters jerseys and called themselves “The Fly Guys.”

They needed an Eagles song. Arlen Saylor, the team’s entertainment director, told them the team already had a song.

“I was like, ‘Really?’” Saunders said. “I want to hear about this.”

A week later, Saylor handed the Fly Guys a cassette tape of “The Eagles Victory Song.” The song was written in 1957 by Charles Borelli and Roger Courtland, two Philadelphia advertising men. The lyrics — “Fight, Eagles, fight on your way to victory,” it began — were printed in the team’s programs at Connie Mack Stadium and was performed by the Sound of Brass, a marching band the Eagles introduced in the 1960s. But the “Victory Song” failed to resonate and eventually faded away.

» READ MORE: “The Eagles Victory Song.” Charles Borelli and Roger Courtland

The Fly Guys listened to the 4-minute instrumental on the cassette tape and decided to give the song a second wind. They upped the song’s tempo and wrote the now iconic phrase “Fly, Eagles Fly,” which was not in the original song. They changed about 20% of the words, swapped out “on your way to victory” for “on the road to victory,” and transformed the old tune into a sing-along.

“When I put those words in ‘Fly, Eagles Fly,’ it fit like a glove,” Saunders said. “It was perfect. I wanted the masses to sing it.”

The Fly Guys, who soon became the Eagles Pep Band, took their tune back to the parking lots and tried to spread their new sound.

“We handed out pieces of paper to every tailgate we went to,” Mansure said. “We sold it to the parking lots. Instead of parading through, we stopped at tailgates and talked to people. We got phone numbers. We just connected with people and soon they were like, ‘Can you show up to our tailgate?’”

Mansure grew up playing football in his Upper Darby backyard with the $12.99 Eagles helmet his mother bought from Sears. He listened to his father’s stories about the old-time Eagles and learned how painful sports can be when the same Raiders player intercepted Ron Jaworski three times in the Super Bowl. The fight song was recorded for Eagles fans by Eagles fans.

“We were them,” Saunders said. “We were the ambassadors of the fan base. We were just like the fans because that’s what we were. Big fans. We were like the 700 Level fan. Just like them. We felt the bad times and felt the good times.”

The Eagles brought the Pep Band onto the field in 1998 as it played the fight song to rev up the crowd before kickoff. A year later, the team started playing the song on the Vet’s speakers after each touchdown. The Eagles won just three games in Andy Reid’s first season, but it was the start of a football revival. The song took off just like the team.

“It’s a rally cry,” Mansure said. “That’s all it is. A rally cry. People want to scream it. It’s grandiose. We lucked out. We all went to school for music, and we’re known for doing a fight song in a pep band. I don’t want to put myself down, but we thought we’d be playing for Harry Connick.”

They never played for Connick, but the song is played on Sundays for nearly 70,000 people. They appear regularly on local TV shows, have traveled with the team to three Super Bowls, still work the tailgates before kickoff, and play events throughout the year. The Pep Band even played a few funerals for the true diehards.

“If we play anything else besides the fight song, we’re lepers,” Mansure said. “That’s the only song they want to hear.”

Not bad for a couple of Mummers who started playing in the parking lots outside the Vet.

“The one thing we love is that it’s not the Eagles. It’s the Philadelphia Eagles,” said Saunders, who credited Angelo Cataldi’s old WIP morning show for helping boost the song’s popularity. “It’s Upper Darby, Upper Dublin, Grays Ferry, Lansdowne, and Summerdale. Everyone is a part of it. We’re all a part of it. We’re the bricklayers, the union workers, the doctors, the lawyers. Everyone in that stadium at Lincoln Financial Field has a common bond that you can’t really say exists anywhere else in the world. You sit next to people who you don’t know and they all have this common bond that they sing the Eagles fight song. It’s electric.”

The guys recorded the song at Saunders’ home studio in Somerdale. Saunders produced the music, and they invited friends over to help sing so it would sound like a stadium full of fans. It felt right, but it needed an ending. And that’s when they created the chant.

“E-A-G-L-E-S,” Mansure said. “We just did it, and it stuck. Now, did it happen in 1942? I don’t know. But it didn’t happen as far as being part of a song or part of an organized chant.”

» READ MORE: The Eagles fight song is everywhere, from grocery stores to funerals

The chant has become ubiquitous, heard everywhere. A Phillies game? E-A-G-L-E-S Eagles! A wedding? E-A-G-L-E-S Eagles! Summer nights down the Shore? E-A-G-L-E-S Eagles! There’s no way to say with certainty that the guys created the chant, but “E-A-G-L-E-S” definitely wasn’t as prevalent before the Pep Band slapped it onto the end of their recording.

“Before that, you were getting more of the ‘Give me an E, give me an A,’ that kind of thing,” Saunders said. “It’s certainly not what it is now. When you have the right amount of syllables and the word ‘Eagles,’ things sometimes just fall together perfectly. Like it belonged there. There was no other way you could end the song. You had to have an ending.”

The guys wrote “Fly, Eagles Fly” and helped make “E-A-G-L-E-S” a thing. It’s hard to imagine that the Eagles ever played without that soundtrack coming from the stands.

“To think that you probably coined the biggest phrase in the history of Philadelphia,” Saunders said. “Can you think of another one? Maybe Brotherly Love. Is there another one?

Well, “We the people” was written here.

“You know,” Saunders said, “I think ‘Fly, Eagles Fly’ might just outdo that.”

He has a point. A group of Philadelphians likely never announced their presence on the Pirates of the Caribbean by reciting the Constitution’s preamble.