Texas Tommy dancers in Action - 1912

What you are looking at

This is a newspaper illustration depicting the Texas Tommy, a ragtime-era social dance that swept through American ballrooms in the early 1910s. The composition is divided into two registers: the lower section shows four couples dancing in close embrace, their bodies angled dynamically across the frame; the upper section shows a chaotic proliferation of smaller figures—perhaps two dozen cherub-like dancers in various stages of movement, their forms becoming progressively more schematic and caricatured toward the edges. The setting is urban and public; the dancers wear contemporary street dress—high-collared jackets, long skirts, boots—suggesting a dance hall or ballroom rather than a theatrical stage. The energy is frenetic: bodies lean, twist, and spiral; skirts flare; arms extend at sharp angles. The line work is rapid and energetic, with heavy blacks used to define the nearer, larger figures and to create silhouettes that read instantly from newsprint.

The dancing

The principal couples hold each other in a close ballroom embrace, but the position is unstable and dynamic—weight is thrown forward and to the side rather than held vertical. The women's long skirts are caught mid-flare, indicating rapid turning or swinging motion; the men's frames are slightly bent, suggesting weight transfer through the legs rather than a held posture. The smaller figures above show extreme positions: legs kicking high, bodies tilted at acute angles, one dancer appearing nearly horizontal. The multiplicity of small figures conveys not precision but abandon—the sense of a dance that prioritized improvisation, social enjoyment, and close physical contact between partners over formal alignment.

The dance depicted

The Texas Tommy was a couple dance that emerged in African-American communities in San Francisco around 1910 and spread rapidly to white ballrooms by 1911–12, becoming briefly notorious for its perceived indecency. Contemporary accounts emphasize the close contact between partners, rapid hip movement, and the freedom dancers had to improvise steps while maintaining the embrace. This image confirms those accounts: the dancers are bound together at hip and torso, and the extreme positions of the limbs suggest vigorous, swinging action rather than the restrained posture of contemporary ballroom dances like the waltz or foxtrot. The inscription 'Ragoine' (possibly 'Ragoïne' or a variant spelling) and the caption's reference to 'the Four Expert Dancers' and a 'Terpischorean Creation' suggests this depicts a public performance or demonstration, probably at a hotel or theatre venue—the 'Empress' is mentioned in the caption.

How it was made

This is a line drawing, likely made from a photographic source or sketched from life, and reproduced via halftone or direct photo-engraving for newspaper publication. The technique allows for rapid tonal shifts from pure black to white, with minimal gray; this economical approach suits the urgency of newspaper production and the need for images to read clearly in poor-quality newsprint. The artist has used weight variation in the line itself—heavier, more deliberate strokes for the foreground figures; lighter, sketchier marks for the background—to create depth and to suggest movement through variation in finish. The style is caricatural without being hostile; the exaggeration serves to amplify the energy and novelty of the dance rather than to mock the dancers.

About this work

This is a newspaper illustration documenting a moment when a new social dance—one that originated in African-American communities and carried associations with sexual transgression—had become fashionable enough to be demonstrated in respectable venues and reported on in the mainstream press. The Texas Tommy was not a theatrical dance; it belonged to the social sphere, to dance halls, cabarets, and hotel ballrooms where couples paid to dance together. By including it in the newspaper, the artist and editor were acknowledging its cultural significance, even as the caption's references to 'expert dancers' and formal venues suggest an attempt to normalize and legitimize a dance that many Americans found shocking. The image is a snapshot of a moment of cultural anxiety and change, frozen in the technology of the newspaper page.

How to look at it

Look first at the contrast between the four foreground couples and the swarm of background figures. The foreground dancers are depicted in sufficient detail to show the actual mechanics of the dance—the embrace, the angle of the bodies, the position of the limbs—while the background becomes increasingly abstract and playful, almost dream-like. This is a compositional choice that suggests two things: first, the artist's primary interest in showing how the Texas Tommy was actually danced, and second, the infectious, almost contagious nature of the dance—it spreads, multiplies, and becomes generalized. The weight of the line in the foreground figures is also significant: the artist has taken care to show that the dance involves not a vertical, held posture but an active, forward-leaning embrace in which both partners are contributing momentum. The flaring skirts and extended limbs in the background convey speed and liberation rather than restraint.

The period

The Texas Tommy appeared at a moment of significant social change in American dance. The early 1910s saw the rapid proliferation of new ragtime and jazz-influenced social dances—the Bunny Hug, the Grizzly Bear, the One-Step, the Turkey Trot—that broke with Victorian ballroom conventions by permitting close contact, improvisation, and visible hip motion. These dances emerged from African-American communities in port cities and quickly became fashionable in white urban ballrooms, generating moral panic among conservatives who saw them as signs of social decay. Newspaper editors, meanwhile, were discovering that images of novel dances sold papers; by 1911–12, illustrated reports of new dance crazes had become a standard feature of the society pages. This particular image, from the Salt Lake Tribune, testifies to the national reach of the craze and the intense interest in documenting and understanding what these new dances looked like and how they were performed.

Where it lives

This illustration was published in the Salt Lake Tribune on February 25, 1912, as part of the newspaper's coverage of social and entertainment news. It is presented here as reproduced on Wikimedia Commons; no holding collection or accession number is currently recorded.

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