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The following is an article from the book Uncle John’s Bathroom Reader Plunges Into History Again.
Dance marathons started out as innocent fun but wound up as grim as the Depression that ended them.
Post-World War I America was in a mood to break all records: popular events included endurance kissing and hand-holding contests, eating marathons, and flagpole sitting. A guy named Shipwreck Kelly became national celebrity after sitting atop a flagpole for 7 days, 13 hours, and 13 minutes. When someone challenged Bill Williams to push a peanut up Pike’s Peak with his nose, he agreed. It took him 30 days, and he won $500 (415 euros) for the feat. It all had to do with the mood of the day. But nothing caught the public’s fancy as much as dance marathons.
A CRAZE IS BORN
The birth of U.S. dance marathons can be traced to early 1923 when, inspired by a record set in Britain a few weeks earlier, Miss Alma Cummings took to the floor of the first American dance marathon, which was held in New York City’s somewhat seedy Audobon Ballroom. Cummings wore out six males partners over the next 27 hours and won a world record. Within a week, a French college student broke that record. A few days later, Cummings retook the title, which was soon broken again, this time by a Cleveland, Ohio, salesgirl. The challenge was on.
A few weeks after Cummings’ win, a Texas dance hall owner got the brilliant idea of charging spectators admission (25¢ during the day, $1 at night). He gave his first winner -Miss Magdalene Williams- a prize of $50 (42 euros). On April 16, Cleveland’s Madeline Gottschick beat William’s record with a time of 66 hours. Within days, that record was broken three times. On June 10, Bernie Brand danced for 217 hours (more than 9 days) and went home with $5,000 (4,151 euros) in prizes.
In just a few months in 1923, the dance marathon had swept the nation and the world. And so it continued throughout the 1920s.
THE DOWNBEAT
The deaths of a few supposedly healthy young people -including 27-year-old Homer Morehouse from heart failure after 87 hours of dancing- brought some unwelcome attention. Officials banded together with church groups (who saw the marathons as immoral) and movie theater owners (who saw the marathons as competition) to try to stomp out the fad. Critics called the contestants “dangerous, useless, and disgraceful,” and they even likened them to the dancing manias of 14th-century Europe.
more …
There’s an odd fad going on in Japan: that a person’s blood type determines his personality.
But it’s not all fun and game. The craze has gone so far that there’s a new form of discrimination called "bura-hara," where someone may not be offered a job because of his blood type.
In Japan, “What’s your type?” is much more than small talk; it can be a paramount question in everything from matchmaking to getting a job.
By type, the Japanese mean blood type, and no amount of scientific debunking can kill a widely held notion that blood tells all. [...]
Taku Kabeya, chief editor at Bungeisha, thinks the appeal comes from having one’s self-image confirmed; readers discover the definition of their blood type and “It’s like ‘Yes, that’s me!’”
As defined by the books, type As are sensitive perfectionists but overanxious; Type Bs are cheerful but eccentric and selfish; Os are curious, generous but stubborn; and ABs are arty but mysterious and unpredictable.
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