This practice grew naturally out of the older tradition of “stag dances,” where men danced with one another in the absence of women, sometimes designating certain partners to take the “ladies’” role. What began as a simple, pragmatic solution—men pairing off to waltz or square dance—evolved in some places into something more elaborate and theatrical.
Behind the painted doors of many saloons, the “dance hall girls” were not women at all, but young men carefully transformed for the evening trade. By day, some worked as clerks, cooks, laundresses’ helpers, or stable boys. By night, they stepped behind a curtain and emerged powdered, corseted, perfumed, and petticoated, their hair curled beneath ribbons and their rough hands hidden in lace gloves.
The customers rarely objected. Many did not know, and many who knew pretended not to. After weeks on a trail drive or months in a mining camp, a pretty face, a swishing skirt, and a willing partner for a waltz were worth more than questions. The dance hall boys learned to move lightly, laugh sweetly, and let a lonely cowboy believe, for the length of one song, that civilization had followed him west.
Some became local favorites. They had stage names like Miss Pearl, Daisy Bell, Frenchy Rose, or Little Lottie. They knew how to tease a gambler into buying another bottle, how to flatter a prospector who had struck silver, and how to avoid the hands of a drunk who forgot the rules. The best of them were not merely substitutes for women; they were performers, hostesses, diplomats, and survivors.
In time, the arrangement became one of the West’s open secrets. A town might lack a schoolhouse, a church, or a proper hotel, but if it had a saloon with music, it had its girls—even if some of those girls shaved before supper and changed back into trousers before dawn.
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| Wearing Shein |
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| Jack Benny (1894-1974) was an American entertainer who appeared en femme on television, film, stage and even on radio. |
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