Turkey trot (dance)
The turkey trot was a dance made popular in the early 1900s. The Turkey Trot was done to fast ragtime music popular in the decade from 1900 to 1910 such as Scott Joplin's Maple Leaf Rag. Driven largely by youth counterculture of the time, the turkey trot fad quickly fell out of favor as the foxtrot, a much more conservative dance step based on the waltz, rose to popularity in 1914.
The basic step consisted of four hopping steps sideways with the feet well apart, first on one leg, then the other with a characteristic rise on the ball of the foot, followed by a drop upon the heel. The dance was embellished with scissor-like flicks of the feet and fast trotting actions with abrupt stops.
It has been said that dancers
It achieved popularity chiefly as a result of its being denounced by the Vatican. It was thought that the positions assumed by the dancers were offensively suggestive. Conservative members of society felt the dance promoted immorality and tried to get it banned at public functions, which only served to increase its popularity.
There were news reports of dancers being fined because "their Turkey Trots were interpreted by the courts as disorderly conduct." In another instance, fifteen working girls were fired from their jobs with the Philadelphia song publisher
One of the means to combat "offensive" dances was the 1913 song,
/ …She's my little Anti-Ragtime Girl….In popular culture
The song "Let's Turkey Trot" by "Little Eva" Boyd and the Cookies (sometimes misattributed to Carole King) reached number 20 on the Billboard Hot 100 in February 1963, fifty years after the dance step's heyday.
References
- ^ Cobb, Roughing It De Luxe, p. 143.