[Collection of Dance Tickets and Song Sheets for Benevolent and Social Clubs].

Chicago: 1920-1928. 88 cards, ranging from 2” x 3” to 6 ” x 4½”. Generally very good: some with light to moderate wear, toning or spotting.

This is a lively collection of tickets, song and dance cards for charity and entertainment events in the Chicago area, many of them illustrated.

These tickets show the craze of jazz dances in the 1920s, as well as the variety of Chicago's cultural, fraternal, political and social groups. The youth were home from war, the independent “flapper” woman on the rise. Jazz music's high energy and “scandalous” movements were apt for the rebellion, fueling philanthropic (and less so) society and club events.

Dances were sponsored by groups like the Cicero “Booster Club” and “Hinky Dinks,” “New Hamburg Fritz Reuter Verein of Chicago” and “Regular Democratic Organization of Berwyn, Ill.” The “Original Crawford Nut Club” held a dance at the Masonic Temple, the “Cardinal Dramatic & Social Club” gave a “Hard Times Party” in 1922, and events were hosted at Kosciuszko Hall by “Cicero Women and Girls,” the “Blue Girls Auxiliary Association” and “Kafka Young Ladies' Social Club.” A “Brickmakers Dance” was held by “Local No. 1” of a union named only in acronym and there were song sheets for the “Hawthorne Club.” Several had jazz-themed illustrations, images of musical acts and ads for local businesses, like “St. Rita's Society No. 108 Polish Alma Mater” with a photographic ad for “Julia W. Kaminski, Undertaker and Embalmer.” One promoted “Mrs. Francis Czaja for Public Library Board” sponsored by the “Women and Girls Civic League” and there was a photographic invitation from “The Revelers” to a dance contest judged by “Prize Winning Charleston Strutters” Jack and Marilouise Hanley, “Chicago's Pride.”

Vivid and fantastic ephemera for social clubs and jazz dances in Chicago in the 1920s. Very good. Item #6935

Price: $500.00