CHARLESTON IS DANCE OF DEATH.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17878, 21 June 1926, Page 8

CHARLESTON IS DANCE OF DEATH.

TERRIFIC STRAIN ON GIRLS OVERDOING IT. LONDON, May 4. Doctors all over the United States are seriously concerned over the physical effects of the Charleston on their women patients. Women are • warned that this, the most popular of modern dances across the Atlantic, is dangerous to health, may necessitate grave operations, and, indeed, may prove fatal if danced too violently or immoderately. because of the terrific strain it imposes on the body and its principal organs, including the heart. Dr W. Power, of Seneca, Kansas, announces that the death a few weeks ago of one of his patients, pretty Evelyn Myers, aged seventeen, was due to peritonitis caused by dancing the Charleston. Miss Anita Reno, aged sixteen, an exhibition dancer, of Coluriibus, Indiana, was suddenly stricken with paralysis. The family' doctor had warned her parents that something would happen if the girl continued to dance the Charleston with her customary enthusiasm, but the warning went unheeded. The girl, thanks largely to her youth, may recover in time, but she will probably never hereafter be permitted to dance the Charleston, with its contortions, jolts, jars, and shocks. Knee Injured. Miss Ruth Conoley, aged twenty, a beautiful dancer in the “Merry Merry” company playing at the Vanderbilt Theatre in New York, is another example cited. She danced the Charleston nightly in the course of her performance, developed a strange soreness and swelling in her right leg, and, despite her doctor’s orders, continued to give her dance, only to collapse in the middle of her performance. She was taken to the Post Graduate Hospital, where the doctors discovered an aggravated case of water-on-the knee —Charleston-knee, in fact. She was operated on, but will never dance the Charleston again. A number of girl competitors in a recent Charleston competition held in New York also collapsed unexpectedly, medical examination showing that they had suffered serious internal derangements that may prove permanent. The danger of the Charleston is found in the fact that it throws the muscles and organs out of their natural alignment, and imposes a serious strain on the heart. The characteristic movements are also performed with stiff knees, the crossing of the legs, the violent shakings and twistings, and the forcible jolts on the solid rigidity of a woman's high heels being opposed to every law of sane and healthful exercise.