Ready Reference Files

The Cakewalk

"It was at harvest festivals that the Cakewalk developed. By some accounts, it was once called the 'chalk-line walk,' and it was a dance done by couples along a straight path, balancing buckets of water on their heads. Later on, it came to be called the Cakewalk because the winning couple would be presented with a cake, often something as simple as a corn cake. It was an elaborate and festive dance, and couples dressed in their best clothes (although it was not until much later, after slavery was abolished, that blacks would have had ...fine clothes...) Dances that involved balancing buckets or glasses of water on the head were common among the slaves and related directly to the African custom of carrying bundles and buckets and baskets on the head." (p. 11)

"At one time in the South, it [the Cakewalk] was popular among plantation owners and other upper-class whites, but that ended with the Civil War and the emancipation of the slaves...By the later years of the nineteenth century, the Cakewalk had become popular among lower-and middle-class urban whites who went to bars and saloons where the syncopated jazz music called ragtime was played." (pp. 22-23)

Two Black dancers, Bert Williams and George Walker, introduced the Cakewalk to theater audiences in New York and London. The Cakewalk became a fad in both the United States and Europe. (pp.22-25)

Source: Haskins, James. Black Dance in America. Crowell, 1990.

Verified by: DA; 8/99

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While the Library has verified the information presented in these files in what it considers to be reliable and authoritative sources, it cannot take responsibility for nor guarantee the accuracy of the information presented.