Note: "Probably, to begin with, 'Jim Crow' was a bird, as Mrs. Jones and Mr. Davis suggest, but during the late 1820's the name became attached to a young white actor, Thomas D. Rice, who had invented a stage characterization of the 'jolly, carefree' plantation slave. In this role, which rapidly became a popular stereotype in the minstrel theater, the young vaudevillian, wearing blackface and in comical rags, did a little eccentric dance while singing."
Reportedly he had heard this refrain from an old Negro man some years earlier. 'Jim Crow' thus developed from a dance imitating the motions of birds and hunters and quite possibly magical in nature into a comical caricature. No wonder the term when used in a political context has a bitter taste today. The Islanders however clearly regard this as a pleasurable dance probably about birds and 'Knock Jim Crow' with enthusiasm and alacrity." --Step It Down" Setting: Alan Lomax's apartment, 3rd Street
About the session: The tenth of 21 recording sessions with Bessie Jones.
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