Turkey trot & other dances

[Jonathan Lighter]

Maugre the reticence of OED, the "grizzly bear" was a pretty well-known dance in America. Maybe not quite the turkey trot, but even so....

(Have been waiting much of my life for the chance to use "maugre" in a sentence.)

JL




George Thompson <george.thompson at NYU.EDU> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: George Thompson
Subject: Turkey trot & other dances
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I have been reading an article by Lawrence Gushee "The Nineteenth-
Century Origins of Jazz", from Black Music Research Journal, Vol. 22
(2002), supplement, pp. 151-174.
This articles gives several early citations for the "Turkey Trot"
dance. Checking the OED, I find, under "Turkey", section 7, the
following:

1839 Southern Lit. Messenger V. 337/1 May-be I didn't set up a high
*turkey~trot, and peeled it like thunder. 1895 F. REMINGTON Pony Tracks
187 He would run me off the plantation at a turkey trot if I did shoot.
1908 W. G. DAVENPORT Butte & Montana beneath X-Ray 42 The light
fantastic, the turkey trot and the pazamala were indulged in by all to
a late hour. 1912 Nation 22 June 427/1 The Lord's prayer, followed by
the ‘Turkey trot’. 1913 G. GROSSMITH in Daily Graphic 12 May 9/1
Adventurous persons will see the Turkey trot or Tango as they are
danced in a cabaret, but not as danced in a Paris ball-room.
--------------------------------

The first two mean "to run like a turkey", but the others refer to the
dance. Gushee refers to "the lyrics to Ernest Hogan's famous song of
1895, "La Pas Ma La," which mentions, in addition to the title dance,
the Bumbisha, the Satin Louis Pass, the Chicago Salute, and
finally, "to the world's fair and do the Turkey Trot."" (p. 170-71)
Gushee's bibliography refers to this song as printed in Kansas City by
J. R. Bell, in 1895.

Gushee also quotes a story from "the somewhat scruffy New Orleans Item
of January 15, 1908, headlined "The Moral Wave Strikes New Orleans
Dancing Schools""
"No More Turkey Trot, a Dance Which Was developed Into Its Highest
State of Efficiency at Milneburg and Bucktown. Signs Up "No Turkey
Trotting Allowed". . . . At Washington Artillery Hall last evening,
hundreds of couples arrived to do the turkey tro. Brookhoven's band
played "Walk Right In and Walk Right Out Again."" (p. 169) The
capitalization follows Gushee, and gives the impression that No More
Turkey Trot ... and the sentence beginning "Signs Up" were also part of
the headline.

Also, from Variety, November 3, 1916, a paragraph, evidently under the
heading "Cabaret", signed O. M. Samuels, from New Orleans:
Now that a siege of erotic dances has started in New York, it may be as
well to place New Orleans on record as the home of "the Grizzly
Bear," "Turkey Trot," "Texas Tommy," and "Todolo" dances. San
Francisco has been receiving the questionable honor." (p. 170)

The dance named in OED's 1908 quotation, "pazamala", isn't given a
separate entry. It's the "La Pas Ma La" from Hogan's 1895 song.
Gushee also notes a song by Irving Jones from 1894 called "Possumala
Dance or My Honey" (p. 171) The bibl. specifies New York: Willis
Woodward, 1894.

"Texas Tommy" doesn't appear in OED. "Tommy" doesn't appear with
reference to dancing. I have seen it stated -- didn't note where --
that this dance name was considered offensive, either at the time or in
retrospect, because "tommy" was slang for prostitute. If so, this
meaning isn't in OED. I can't probably find this reference.

I won't argue if the OED says that its mandate doesn't require it to
document the name of every dance fad and that it will leave "the
Grizzly Bear" to some specialized dictionary. But "pazamala", "Pas Ma
La" or "Possumala" are a distinct word that survived for 12 years or
so. "Bumbisha", which also isn't in OED, is another distinctive
word. "Todolo" is of interest at least because an early composition by
Duke Ellington is "St. Louis Todolo".

Gushee also says "The slang term "ratty" is commonly used to
describe "hot" music or the oler ragtime style or a kind of "strutting
walk ***." (p. 154, fn. 2) He cites Merriam-Webster's Third and
several mid-1970s books of interviews with NO musicians. This sense is
not in OED.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.


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