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Transcription: [00:15:30]
{SPEAKER name="Willie "Ashcan" Jones"}
And first I went to the store and I watched what they did, and when they really need somebody to do something I was there to do it.

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So that's my first way of getting away from home.

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I went away with a carnival. And then later on then I started learning how to dance.

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I wanted to be a dancer so I tried to learn how to dance, but I wanted to tap dance and I found out I couldn't learn how to tap dance.

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So I learned a dance they call it Lindy Hop. And I'm guessing y'all never heard of it because they–

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That's why we had to tell about this because they took the Lindy Hop from us and turned it into the Jitterbug.

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So-that- everybody all know the Jitterbug but they don't know the Lindy Hop. The Lindy Hop was the first one it was the Lindy Hop.

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But they took it from us and turned it into the Jitterbug so it wouldn't be our dance it was somebody else's dance.

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When we did it it's just like the break dancers today: you go someplace they got a big sign up there, "No break-dancing here," 'cause they say you'll tear up everything.

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So when I was young, when we would do Lindy Hop they would have it in there- they wouldn't call it the Lindy Hop they said "No part of the Big Apple here."

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'Cause everybody thought the Big Apple and the Lindy Hop were the same but it was different.

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You did Lindy Hop, Big Apple was a dance that you did everything like you see 'em doing today.

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On that what Saturday night something they got having a Saturday night show what is it there?

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[[unintelligible crowd chatter]]

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Saturday Night Fever. Well see, that's what the uh- Big Apple was years ago they did the same thing years ago. We called it Big Apple you could do anything you wanted to do.

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But the Lindy Hop you had to do one special dance- you couldn't turn your girl loose no, no longer you could turn 'round and back.

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But now you just turn 'em loose you do what you want to do and they do what they want to do.

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It's a lot of different than dances now. But they still call it partner dances.

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Which is not partner dance no more. Anytime you turn the hand- take the hand and loose from a girl,

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More than the time than you can turn 'round it's no more partners.

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{SPEAKER name="Interviewer"}
Well you started off with a carnival then tried to be a dancer, right?

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{SPEAKER name="Jones"}
Oh yeah, I tried to be a dancer with the carnival and I couldn't.

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{SPEAKER name="Interviewer"}
Now, one thing that people- when they think about carnivals nowadays, folks tend to think of rides and gambling and games, but now you're talking about dancing on a carnival— could you tell us a little bit about

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where you would dance on a carnival and how carnivals were different in those days?

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{SPEAKER name="Jones"}
Well at that time, you- when a carnival come to town, they had to have a black show. At that time we didn't call it a black show, we called it a minstrel show or a plantation show.

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[[thunder]]

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Or a jig show. You had to have one of them but see you couldn't come to town with just rides and games at that time,

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because you had a lot of people didn't go— didn't ride, you had a lot of people didn't play the games.

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But they saved up all the year to go to that show and they would come in and see that minstrel show

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uh- they call it their plantation show or the black show.

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Or the colored show they call it all kind of show then. But the carnival had to have one with them then.

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But today they don't have to have 'em. See they can come in with rides and things but you couldn't just come with just rides and games at that time.

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So that's why you had so many comedians, so many show people at that time.

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But now, what you see at— what— if you ever go in to that tent and see what I do, you'll hardly ever see it today.

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{SPEAKER name="Interviewer"}
So, there wasn't then an entire— there was an entirely different tradition of carnivals that of– including entertainment, a special top, a special tent

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that had nothing but a show in it— a show that included music, dance, and humor; the sort of comedy that Willie Jones still does.

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Now, Willie started as a dancer with carnivals, but really didn't stay with carnivals all that long time before he had jumped on to another form of entertainment.

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Where did you go after carnivals as a dancer but before you went on to do the Lindy Hop?

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{SPEAKER name="Jones"}
Well uh, I went on to the-