Black Bottom

Joan Renner / Hollywood, Joan Renner, The wacko file / Black Bottom, charleston, dance crazes, kinkajou / 0 comments

Shake a Tail Feather

October 15, 2007

shake a tail feather headline

October 15, 1927 the charleston
Hollywood

Sheiks and Shebas…the Kinkajou and the Charleston are dead! Long live the Rooster Flap! The newest dance craze to take Hollywood by storm debuted at a dinner dance hosted by actress Molly O’Day. A rustic cousin of the Black Bottom, the Rooster Flap is danced to a tune reminiscent of “Turkey in the Straw”. Following a lively dance lesson, O’Day’s tinseltown friends were ready to greet the dawn with a cock-a-doodle-doo and a shimmy and a shake.

See YOU on the dance floor!

Joan Renner / dancing, Hollywood, Joan Renner, The wacko file / big feet, Black Bottom, MGM, Olive Oyl, Tango, The Charleston / 1 comment

You Make Me Feel Like Dancing

July 16, 2007

Big Feet Headline

July 16, 1927
Hollywood

“You make me feel like dancin’
I wanna dance my life away…”
— You Make Me Feel Like Dancing, written by Vincent Poncia, Jr. and Gerard Hugh Sayer, recorded by Leo Sayer

Bad news ladies – your feet have grown larger over the past twenty years. The reason? Dancing! Your older female relatives may have danced the night away, but they were tripping the light fantastic to the sedate melodies of the waltz and the two-step. The kinder, gentler dances of bygone days made it possible for women to keep their petite size three tootsies from spreading out like flapjacks. Modern gals stomp around the dance floor gyrating to the tango, Charleston, and black bottom. As a result of all this vigorous activity, today the average girl wears anywhere from four and a half to a size six shoe!

“As athletics become more popular for women and modern dances become more violent feet will grow in accordance. Some day women will Olive Oyl have feet as large as men’s are now”, said Mr. Julian Alfred, a director of musical choruses at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

Women of the future – beware! You are fated to have feet as big as Olive Oyl’s.

“Walkin’ with my baby she’s got great big feet
She’s long, lean, and lanky and ain’t had nothing to eat
She’s my baby and I love her just the same
Crazy ‘bout that woman cause Caldonia is her name…”
– Caldonia, written by Fleecie Moore