Shim Sham - History

History

Although Willie Bryant and Leonard Reed are often credited with the origin while at the Lafayette Theater, flash-dancer Joe Jones of The Three Little Words has stated that he helped invent the routine. Marshall and Jean Stearns concluded that all of these dancers, and others, helped create the routine since it contained elements of various older steps.

In the late 1920s and the 1930s, at the end of many performances, all of the musicians, singers, and dancers would get together on stage and do one last routine: the Shim Sham Shimmy. Tap dancers would perform technical variations, while singers and musicians would shuffle along as they were able.

According to tap dancer Howard “Stretch” Johnson, whose sister was one of the featured dancers at the Cotton Club in the early 1930s, the Shim-Sham or Shimmy was invented by chorus line dancers at the 101 Ranch on 140th Street in Harlem. The shambling nature of the steps, especially the first eight bars, and the fact that females were played by men was reflected in the contraction “shim,” or "she him."

It became popular at Connie's Inn in Harlem when The Three Little Words would close their show and invite everyone to join in, "and the whole club would join us, including the waiters. For awhile people were doing the Shim Sham up and down Seventh Avenue all night long," according to Jones. The year was 1931.