Ladies, ‘swan on in’ in your elegant, lace-edged, or drop-waisted vintage dresses, or whirl on in in flapper fashion with beads and fringes bouncing. ‘Dapper dandies’, too, may join the fashion show and ‘ankle’ on down our catwalk to the Twenties’ tunes as Café Gananoque, ‘tickles the ivories’.
A ‘flapper’ was the new woman of the age who wanted freedom from the constraints society and fashion had placed upon women. For the first time, women exposed some skin. Clothing was simplified, arms were bared, sometimes knees were rouged in case they were seen as a hemline flipped up on the dance floor. Flappers weren’t afraid to show off their ‘gams’, and they loved to dance all night.
In the words of a famous Roaring Twenties’ song, the flapper was “a highly energetic, dissuadable, magnetic, peripatetic, athletic kind of girl.” She didn’t succumb to ‘applesauce’. She never had a ‘fire extinguisher’ and wanted no part of a ‘handcuff’. She could have a ‘belt’ at the bar because for the first time she was a liberated woman and that was the ‘bees knees’.
Men of the era were ‘brooksies’, especially the gangsters. Al Capone was one of the best dressed and always wore his ‘glad rags’. Of course, due to the illegal liquor trade, gangsters had ‘heavy sugar’.
World War I had just ended and everyone was ‘putting on the ritz’. Life was the ‘berries’. And even though the sale of alcohol was illegal, consuming it wasn’t, and no one wanted to drink ‘noodle juice’. So the backalley ‘speakeasies’ were doing a thriving business.
Rockport wants to take you back to the Roaring Twenties – the Jazz Age- at their outdoor ‘speak’ – Zelda’s – on Friday night with the zoot-suited, seven piece Brian Downey Band playing tunes of the Twenties. Join us at Cornwall’s Point for the street dance right after the fashion show.
And this Prohibition festival is not ‘dry’. Drop a few ‘clams’ or an ‘Abe’s Cabe’ for a ‘belt’ at Zelda’s Speakeasy…hopefully there won’t be a raid by ‘Pro Hi’s’…then again you never know. So try not to get too ‘splifficated’ or you may be arrested … or worse- miss out on the Twenties’ activities planned for all day Saturday.
Antique ‘struggle buggies’ and a Rum Runners’ Boating Challenge for local River Rats will give lots of opportunity for ‘beating one’s gums’. Twenties’dance demos, a barbershop octet, and our piano man will also entertain. A Children’s Zone is planned for children aged ten years and under from noon until 4 p.m.,with games, balloons, face painting, and an experiential painting station led by professional Rockport artist, Bruce Sherman. A ‘Speakeasy’ Boat cruise offered by Rockport Boatline at 6 p.m. should be the ‘cat’s pyjamas’. Our Flapper’s Ball, featuring the Spencer Evans trio, will also be the ‘elephant’s eyebrows’ on Saturday night at Caiger’s Riverside Resort. Sunday will see an old-fashioned church picnic after church services and an antique boat show.
