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imagining louise madison/continued from p. 7Jersey. LaVaughn and friends tookseats in a remote corner of thenightclub and guzzled cherrygarnishedglasses of ginger-ale thatCy brought for them. Soon Louisehit the stage, dancing solo, deckedout in white trousers, white tails,and low-heeled shoes (“just like aman would wear,” LaVaughnadded).“She was doing so muchdancing, it was unbelievable.”Hercommand of the stage and thequality of her rhythms capturedadmired Madison’s dancing.(LaVaughn relates that a pot ofbeans and hog jowl was simmeringon the stove when they arrived, andLouise invited them to join her fordinner.) There were suspicions, orassumptions, that she was gay. Sheenjoyed a good card game,especially in the downtime spent indressing rooms between shows.Some of the Philadelphia tapveterans were convinced that shewas responsible for steering Babytone, hair texture, and facialfeatures—imposed by blacks aswell as white—and its impact onwho got what breaks, is a frequenttheme in the testimonies of thewomen featured in Plenty andother women entertainers of thatera. Or might she have been limitedby her choice to perform solo?While there were other womenwho had solo acts, (the Stearnsassert that if women dancers weregood, they usually performed alone,This page:Hortense AllenJordan and LibbySpencer in finale of“Stepping in Time,”February 1994. Nextpage: Libby Spencerrehearsing dancers for“Stepping.” Photoscourtesy Jane Levine.18LaVaughn’s attention andembedded themselves in hismemory, such that, more than a halfcentury later, you can still hear theexcitement in his description ofthis first encounter: “She was doingas much dancing as any tap loverwould ever want to see!”About adecade later, in 1955,LaVaughn, bythen a professional hoofer,encountered Louise when theyboth were on a show at New York’sApollo Theater. Once again, he wasawed by her style and techniqueand she was generous with herencouragement to LaVaughn andhis dance partners.Despite Louise’s popularity withaudiences and the respect shecommanded from her peers, little isknown about her career or privatelife.What glimpses there are tend tobe fragmented and disconnected.We know that she lived in NorthPhiladelphia: LaVaughn once visitedher along with master tap dancerJerry Taps Sealy, who greatlyLaurence to abandon singing fortap dancing—a career move thatresulted in Laurence becoming ajazz tap icon. Marshall and JeanStearns, in their classic volume JazzDance:The Story of AmericanVernacular Dance,credit Louisewith “cut[ting] a five-tap Wing like aman.” 1 It’s not clear when or whyshe retired from performing.Entertainers who were Louise’speers wondered and speculatedwhy, given her stage presence andtechnical skill, she did not have alonger and more successful career.(As LaVaughn put it,“why she neverdid make it like she should have”).Without a doubt, opportunitieswere limited for black performersin general, and especially forwomen who dared to pursue sucha male-dominated domain as tapdancing. But beyond theseconsiderable hurdles, was shehampered, as Dave McHarrispronounced, by her looks? Thetyranny of attitudes toward skinas soloists), 2 it seems that theconvention of the time for bothmen and women hoofers was toperform in teams of two, three, orfour dancers—although outside ofchorus lines, it was relativelyuncommon for women to performin an all-female ensemble. LaVaughncites a business motive for theprevalence of duos, trios, etc., inthat agents could demand biggerfees, and realize largercommissions, for a team than for asingle tap dancer. Otherexplanations include IsabelleFambro’s perspective that her andher partner’s act, Billy and EleanorByrd, was designed to capitalize onthe popularity of Marge and GowerChampion, who were theprototypical white elegant stagecouple. For Baby Edwards, workingwith a male partner gave herprotection and a sense of securityon the road.Was Louise’s use of male attireonstage off-putting to agents and
presenters? Other femaleforerunners and contemporaries ofLouise donned suits, ties and lowheeledsuits. Mildred Candi Thorpeand Jewel Pepper Welch, of thePhiladelphia-based team of Candiand Pepper wore zoot suits andWindsor-knotted ties.Wheninterviewed in the early 1990s,Candi noted that “people wanted tosee flesh but we never exposed ourbodies.” Indeed, one of the mostsuccessful and durable acts into speculate on what social factorsand personal choices might havedriven or hindered Louise’s dancecareer,we will have to contentourselves with what little we know ofher.It has been many years since shecould speak to us in her own voice,and it is unlikely that her survivingcontemporaries can illuminate thedetails of her life and talent more thanthey have already.But even if a troveof data lay right around the corner,Ithink I would prefer the Louise in myvaudeville, the Whitman Sisterstroupe, featured one of the sisters asa male impersonator. But I wouldn’tunderestimate the ambivalencethere might have been in Louise’stime toward women who dared tochallenge convention by not onlypracticing a male art form, but alsopresenting themselves dressedlike men.A personal experience thatoffered me a glimpse of attitudesthat Louse Madison and her peersmight have encountered occurredin 1989 when LaVaughn and I were inNew York City taping the PBS special,Gregory Hines’Tap Dance inAmerica.LaVaughn and I,bothdressed in tuxedos,had just finishedour up-tempo,wing-filled rendition of“How High the Moon.”The wife of taplegend Bunny Briggs came backstageand congratulated me on my dancing,then added,“Dear,you need to getyourself a little skirt.At first I thoughtyou were a young boy up there.”As intriguing as it is to theorize,imagination—the Louise conjuredfrom a few scraps of potentstorytelling,the Louise whose powersof self-invention and whosewillingness to challenge custom andconvention are unsullied byinconvenient facts.I prefer the Louisewhose technical and stylistic muscleis immune to comparisons withgrainy film footage and offhand,possibly uninformed,critiques.Ichoose the Louise in my imagination,the one that was,in LaVaughn’swords, unbelievable.1NY: Macmillan, 1968, p.1952ibid, p. 195●●●Long-time PFP board memberGermaine Ingram initiated the PFPTap Initiative which includedinterviews with veteran Philadelphiahoofers, and which resulted in theproduction Stepping in Time, and thedocumentary and exhibition Plentyof Good Women Dancers. Germaineis currently a consultant oneducational and child welfare policyand programs.To purchase the newlyreleased DVD Plenty of Good WomenDancers, see p. 20, or visit ourwebsite. Plenty will be broadcast inthe Philadelphia area on March 28,2005 at 10 PM on WHYY-TV 12.19
Page 1 and 2: magazine of thephiladelphia folklor
Page 3 and 4: from theeditorAs the first black wo
Page 5 and 6: ImaginingLouise Madison:remembering
Page 7 and 8: husband, tap dancer and all-arounds
Page 9 and 10: through me.I struggled. I strangled
Page 11 and 12: Photos this page: LindaGoss and her
Page 13 and 14: y ThelmaShelton RobinsonFamily phot
Page 15 and 16: ject. Because as a senior, you had
Page 17: PFP, ODUNDE & ART SANCTUARY PRESENT
Page 21 and 22: waking up the people/continued from
Page 23 and 24: waking up the people /continued fro

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