History – Page 80 – Tacky Raccoons

Do the Camel Walk

James Brown, aka Butane James, Mr. PleasePleasePlease, Mr. Dynamite, The Hardest Working Man In Show Business, Soul Brother No. 1 & The Godfather of Soul shows you how to do the dances you heard about, but rarely saw (at least not as good as JB could do ’em), and all within a minute and 39 seconds:

1.The Crab Dance

2.The Boogaloo

3.The Funky Chicken

4.The James Brown

5.The Mash Potato

6.The Camel Walk

7.The Robot

8. The Soul Train

I’m not sure about the name of the first dance, since it’s in JamesSpeak. Video link jumped out at me and made me get up and get on down, from Arbroath.

The Zen of Nancy

Ernie Bushmiller’s “Nancy” was one of the most innocuous yet ubiquitous comic strips ever. It was never funny or clever, it was just odd, and it ran in hundreds of papers for decades. There are many Nancy afficionados/analysts out there, just google ’em. One of the best taps into the zen of the strip, with a game called, “Five Card Nancy,” and it’s not funny either.

Although Nancy didn’t have a mom or a dad in the strip, her Aunt Fritzi took care of her. Fritzi was a babe, and better looking than Blondie. Honest.

Nancy’s best friend Sluggo was odd in his own zen-like way:

There are so many pointless, humorless comic strips around today that try to be funny. At least Bushmiller’s “Nancy” was deliberately pointless and rarely humorous, but it was drafted in a tight recognizable style.

Sources: Nancy panel clipped from the Sunday funnies years ago; Aunt Fritzi from here; Sluggo panels from here and here.

Wavy Gravy Lives!

George Carlin, and later Cheech y Chong, were arguably the first hippie comedians, although an argument could be made that all hippies were comedians. At least these guys were intentionally funny.

But Wavy Gravy owns the title of being the First Hippie Clown. He even played Woodstock, and he’s still alive.

Proof can be found on the Wavy Gravy Homepage.

1913 Waco, Texas

There’s an excellent ongoing compilation of photos of early Americana from Shorpy. Many photos, like this one, have descriptions of who, what, when and where. Be sure to read the story of “Shorpy.”

“Waco, Texas. November 1913. Isaac Boyett: ‘I’m de whole show.’ The twelve-year-old proprietor, manager and messenger of the Club Messenger Service, 402 Austin Street. The photo shows him in the heart of the Red Light district where he was delivering messages as he does several times a day. Said he knows the houses and some of the inmates. Has been doing this for one year, working until 9:30 P.M. Saturdays. Not so late on other nights. Makes from six to ten dollars a week.”

According to this calculator, $6 to $10 a week in 1913 equates to $124.55 to $207.58 per week in 2007 dollars. Most of Isaac’s earnings prolly went for food for his family.