Old Print Article: “Coney Island Dances,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle (1897)

October 11, 2010 in Old Print Articles, Urban Studies | Permalink

"The chief offender down there is a flabby woman."

I think most physicians agree that dancing is the leading cause of syphilis, but there was one particularly outrageous dance being performed at Coney Island in the 1890s. It was called the “coucheee-couchee.” In its August 10, 1897 issue, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle took aim at this wicked piece of choreaography and incidentally revealed not only a puritan streak but a racist one as well. An excerpt:

“District Attorney Backus says he intends to break up the immoral dances and shows at Coney Island. Justice Lemon, who is holding court at the Island, says there are shows positively suggestive of immorality which should be repressed by the strong arm of the law. And so it is likely that the vile couchee-couchee dance, driven out of Chicago, New York, old Brooklyn and every city in the civilized world will not be permitted even at Coney Island. This is the vulgar Turkish dance which a roving minister in amazing simplicity recently characterized as ‘a religious dance,’ a dance which has been viewed in Brooklyn only behind locked doors, after precautions were taken against a descent by the police. In commenting upon the too-sweet-to-be-wholesome innocence of this unattached clergyman’s indorsement of the vulgar dance a county official said to the writer of this column:

"And so it is likely that the vile couchee-couchee dance, driven out of Chicago, New York, old Brooklyn and every city in the civilized world will not be permitted even at Coney Island."

‘I do not think that the authorities should place Puritanical restrictions on Coney Island shows, but they should insist on decency. There is no prudishness in insisting that a dance which would not be tolerated for one minute in public by the New York police, or anywhere within the limits of the old city of Brooklyn, shall be repressed at Coney Island. The chief offender down there is a flabby woman who would have been indicted, as were the Seeley dinner dancers, if the police had caught her at performances which she gave  privately before a party of half drunken men. The proprietor of the theater at which she appears recently promised that the couchee-couchee would be abandoned, but with his recentl clerical indorsement he doubtless felt it would be safe to go ahead with the dance again. But Captain Collins will arrest her if it is repeated. Unfortunately for the Turk, many ministers and private citizens of good repute have demanded that the district attorney shall prosecute if he again violates the law. The New York press agents of the immoral shows at Coney Island will have to work hard to earn their salaries during the remainder of the summer season.

A police official or any newspaper man who desires to repress or expose the immoralities of Coney Island, will see little or nothing of the evils which disgrace this resort if he goes down there and discloses his identity. The couchee-couchee woman suddenly becomes as demure as a demi mondaine at a christening; the proprietor of a saloon in which blacks and whites of both sexes usually meet on free and easy terms appears as a stern enforcer of order and morality; the skin bagatelle tables are thrown aside; gambling games cannot be found; the confidence men and pickpockets as a matter of course do not make themselves known to the visitors, and the proprietors of bagnios are on their guard. The district attorney has a stack of affidavits made by responsible citizens, which clearly indicate the character of evils which have flourished at the Island. He is on the right track, and will meet with popular approval, no matter what indorsements may be given to the other dance house dives to which young loafers and criminals hunt for victims.”

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